


Brightest

by destielbooty



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 7 years at hogwarts, F/M, Friendship, Kinda, Marauder Hermione, Marauders' Era, Not Canon Compliant, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Build, Time Travel, a bit of major character death but its not explicit, at all, but eventually i always post something, but there's nothing like a schedule, i'm still excited with the fic but i don't have much time to write it, obviously, so when i can i post, there's death, very slow updates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-21
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-03-07 15:18:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 24,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13437567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/destielbooty/pseuds/destielbooty
Summary: When everything is lost, the brightest witch of her age makes a fool move. Going back to the past to defeat Voldemort is Hermione's only chance to make things right again, but when realizes her potion has taken her back a few more years than she had planned, her mision turns into assuring her best friend has a family to grow with.- I'm not so sure about the title so that may change, also, I'm currently writing the story, so I may add more tags as it grows, when I do this, I'll say it in the notes in case it's something you don't want to read -[THIS STORY IS ON HIATUS, IT'S NOT FINISHED, READ AT YOUR OWN RISK] ['CAUSE YOU'LL GET FRUSTRATED]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time writing Harry Potter fan fiction, but I've read tons of it, and I really enjoy time travel fics, so here I am, trying it out! I hope you guys like it! And I hope I finish it ._.

She knew what the stakes of time traveling were. She knew she wasn’t supposed to change anything. She knew the mere fact that she was there could be horrendous. But she didn’t care Harry Potter was dead. Harry Potter had been killed and their hope was gone. When Dumbledore had died, it had hurt, but they had hold onto the fact that Harry was alive. Harry Potter, They-Boy-Who-Lived. He would be the one to save them all. Until he had, too, died. At the hands of Bellatrix Lestrange, Harry Potter had died, alone and suffering.

Hermione and Ron had been devastated, as Harry was not only the Chosen One, but also their friend. Their brother. Even when their lives had been in danger, they were certain Harry was going to come out of that alive. They were certain that light would win. They had been innocent, and stupid, putting their hopes in fate.

 _No more,_ thought Hermione, as she brewed the potion. _Diary. Ring. Locket. Cup. Diadem. Snake_.

She had rushed into action before she had thought things over. It had taken her almost a week to brew the potion that would take her to the past, where she could take all her knowledge about Voldemort, and throw them to his face. And finally beat him.

It was, of course, risky but it was their only option left. She would sacrifice herself for the cause, just like Harry had been doing for his whole life. She would try to make things right.

There was a knock on the door, and she knew it was Ron. “Come in,” she said, loud enough for him to hear from the outside of the girl’s bathroom. She thought it was the right place for the potion, as it was where she, Harry and Ron had taken the Polyjuice potion on their second year.

Ron was pale, even paler than usual, and he had dark circles under his eyes. He, too, was hunted by the death of his best friend. “What are you doing?” He asked.

The last time they had talked to each other had been at Harry’s funeral, where they had held each other, promising not to break down in front of the cameras. Once it was finished, they had drunk until they passed out, and parted ways without a word the next morning.

“A potion,” she answered. “I’m going to change things, Ron.”

He looked at her with his face blank for a moment, before his features turned into an anger mask, “a potion is not going to change anything, Hermione!”

She understood. Ron was angry, and she knew it was just that he wanted to feel anything but the sorrow that was clouding his mind, just like it was clouding hers. “I’m going back in time.” That was enough to make him shut up. “I’ve read some books and the safest thing would be to appear at a time when I was not born yet. I’m not going to do that because that’s when Voldemort was strongest, so I’m going to try to appear somewhere in 1982.”

Ron remained stunned.

She continued talking, adverting her eyes to the potion. “It’s dangerous, but it’s the only thing I can think of. If I achieve my mission, Harry won’t die, he will live a happy life, too. Thousands of people won’t die if I do this right.”

“And if you don’t?” Ron asked.

“I don’t know,” she answered truthfully, “everything could change and be worse. But I must try. I have to save as many lives as possible.”

“Why am I here?” Ron asked. “By the way you’re speaking, you aren’t asking me to go with you.”

She shocked her head. “I need you to be here when I take this potion. I found it in a book from the forbidden section, and I’m not sure if I can trust it.”

Ron nodded, breathing deeply.

“You can’t tell anyone.” Ron nodded again. “I can see Professor McGonagall’s face if she found out. She would be enraged.”

“So basically, this is a really bad idea,” Ron mumbled, and Hermione nodded. “Good, all our bad ideas have worked out in the end.”

 _Not all of them_ , she thought, but she didn’t say the words. Ron’s face changed into something sad, and she knew he had thought about it as well.

“The potion needs at least one day more to brew,” she said in a soft voice. “I’m going to spend one last night in this life, and I need one last memory of everyone.”

It wasn’t going to be a happy memory, she realized as she and Ron made their way towards Hogwarts Dinning Room. Everyone knew they would be lost without Harry Potter, and they were now feeling their losses. More than ever. Their group wasn’t hard to find, as the read hair was like a beacon. They were all surrounding Ginny, who was crying. Hermione sighed, Ginny and Harry had been apart for almost a year, and they both thought they would get to be together once the war was over. It was sad that she had lost her loved one in that way.

Ron and she made their way towards the family, and once they arrived, the other Weasleys smiled at them. “How are you guys doing?” Charlie asked.

Hermione felt Ron shrug, and she simply ignored the question and sat next to Ginny, pulling her into a hug. “Do you know that Harry once fell asleep in the library and when he woke up the first thing he said was your name?”

Ginny laughed softly at that. “He was an idiot.”

“Yes. He was. And that time when he basically spilled pumpkin juice all over his potion homework because he was so busy looking at you and Dean,” it was Hermione’s time to laugh.

In the end, the whole group talked about stupid moments that Harry and Fred had done. Molly commented on some stupid stuff Remus had done, and slowly, they filled that sorrow with memories. It was the best way to remember their beloved ones, by funny moments, as those were the ones they wanted to keep.

Professor McGonagall made an appearance to tell everyone that they should sleep, as the next day would be the one last battle. They were going to lose, they all knew. And still, they went to bed. They weren’t going to go without a fight.

“Thank you for earlier,” Ginny told Hermione, “I just thought that everything would go well… I know it was dumb from me.”

“I thought so too,” Hermione confessed. “Good night.”

“Good night.”

The next morning awoke them with a loud sound. It was the sound of the Death Eaters trying to get into the castle again. Everyone bolter up and went into action. It took Hermione only a second to find Ron. “We have to go. Come on.”

“But Hermione, the Death Eaters!” Ron protested as she grabbed his hand to lead him to Myrtle’s bathroom.

“You have to help me, Ron, then you can go fight as many filthy Death Eaters as you wish!” She answered heatedly.

They got to the bathroom and Hermione checked the potion. It would have been ideal for it to brew a couple more hours, but they didn’t have time. The castle trembled, as if to rush them.

She hugged him, taking a moment to reassure herself with his smell. “I hope this works out,” he mumbled.

“I do too.”

He pulled away just enough so they could “Promise me you’ll be careful.” His eyes were the clearest they had been the whole week, and she nodded, hugging him tightly again.

“I will. I love you, Ronald Weasley.”

“I love you too, Hermione Granger.”

And then, she took the potion.


	2. Chapter 2

The first thing she noticed was that the potion tasted horribly, but that didn’t surprise her. What did surprise her was when said potion felt like stones in her stomach. She groaned both at the pain and at the inconvenience of having it all wrong. Eventually, the pain grew more and more, and she ended up with tears prickling her eyes. It was so bad that she puked.

It took her a couple of minutes to regain at least a little tiny bit of composure, and only when she did, did she open her eyes.

She was alone, and the light was different. Also, there were no sounds of the battle that should be taking place outside. It took her a moment until she realized that it had worked. The potion had worked.

She fell to her knees and cried. She cried until someone opened the door to the bathroom and she heard voices of the boys coming in. Four voices, two of which she recognized. Soon, said boys where in front of her, all four of them looking like deers caught in headlights. The sight made her weep harder.

Sirius, Remus, James and Peter looked like second years, maybe even first years, and even if they were looking at her worriedly, they still seemed happy, not a single trace of despair that she had seen in both Remus and Sirius when they were older, and James Potter, he was alive. If only Harry could see him…

“Are you alright?” Remus asked, and in any other situation she would have laughed at how high his voice was in contrast of what she knew would be his voice as a grownup. “Miss?” He asked again, as he hadn’t got an answer.

She nodded. “I need… I need to see Dumbledore.”

“He’s not in the castle, m’am,” who she knew to be James Potter answered. “Maybe you can talk with Professor McGonagall.”

“McGonagall… Yes… Yes, of course. Where is she?”

“In her class, probably,” answered Remus, still looking at her with a worried expression.

“Thank you, boys,” she answered while she drew her wand out of the back pocket of her jeans. “ _Obliviate_.”

The four boys stood there with dumbfounded expressions and she got out of the bathroom. Harry had told her about his father, or at least what Sirius and Remus had told him, and she guessed she must have appeared in 1972, judging by the boys’ appearances.

She rushed towards McGonagall’s class and barged inside, not thinking of the fact that it was a _class_. Twenty eyes turned to look at her, and she saw the older witch point her with her wand. “Who are you?” She asked, and her voice was scary, more than anytime Hermione had heard the witch talk.

“I need a word with you, Minerva, right in this moment,” she answered, not balking down.

The witch looked at her class and squared her shoulders even more before walking towards the door. “Mr. Parkinson, read the passage on page 540.”

Both women got out of the class, and Hermione started breading more calmly then. “Who are you?” McGonagall asked again.

In that moment, Hermione realized that the woman was not going to believe her, and even if she did, she was going to try to stop her. “I am here at an Order’s mission,” she whispered. “I cannot tell you about it, Professor, as it is so secret only one more person knows about it.”

“And why do you come to me?”

“Some kids told me Dumbledore was not at Hogwarts and I needed to immediately report my arrival. I also need your help with something else.” The woman looked at her expectantly, as if she wanted to hear all the information before saying anything. “In order to get this mission to work, I will have to infiltrate in Hogwarts, and I want to do it as a first or second year student. For that I’ll obviously need a de-aging potion.”

She had landed in the seventies, and if she didn’t take advantage of the situation to save Harry’s parents, she would never forgive herself. Ever.

“You haven’t told me your name, or anything about you that proofs you are trustworthy.” The woman said, through her teeth.

“My name is Hermione Jean Granger. I am eighteen years old. Both my parents are muggles. I have fought against Dark Magic and blood purists, and I bear the marks of it.” She showed her the “ _mudblood_ ” scar in her arm. The old witch gasped.

“Oh dear…”, she mumbled, just like Hermione had known she would. “I want to believe you, Miss Granger, but you do understand what is coming, right? I can’t just let you roam the school until Dumbledore comes back. You will have to discuss your mission with him.”

“I… Yes. Of course. I understand. I will be renting a room in Hogsmeade.” She relented.

“Disguise yourself, Miss Granger. There are a lot of threats outside this school.”

Hermione nodded, not wanting to add that there were a lot of threats inside the school too. Her mind went to the basilisk living in the chamber underneath the castle, and that made her think of Harry. Would Harry still kill the basilisk if he had not been The-Boy-Who-Lived? It took Hermione just a moment to realize that he wouldn’t need to, because if Voldemort was defeated, the basilisk would never be awoken.

 _Diary. Ring. Locket. Cup. Diadem. Snake_ , she repeated in her head.

With a light tap on her nose, she temporarily changed her features, she made her eyes slightly bigger and blue, and her hair black. Nobody would be paying her enough attention that they would compare her to her real self once she was back at the school, so she was not worried. Once she got out of the castle – with a signed paper from McGonagall herself –, she made her way towards Hogsmeade, and there, she quickly went to the Three Broomsticks, where Rosmerta welcomed her with a smile that Hermione returned half-heartedly.

“I need a room,” she said.

“For how long?” Rosmerta asked.

“I’m not exactly sure as it involves Dumbledore,” Hermione joked, earning a laugh from the other woman, “so I can’t be sure. I also don’t have a lot of money, so I’ll probably only be able to pay the cheapest, worst conditioned room.”

“That’s alright, sweetie, give me what you’ve got, and we’ll work it out.” In her timeline, Rosmerta was not quite rood, but she definitely wasn’t as trusting as the woman she had in front of her. Maybe it was her young age, but Hermione could not help but be surprised.

She placed the few coins she had in her pocket and tried hard to ignore the woman’s cringe. I’m sorry, darling, but this is only worth two days.

Hermione nodded sadly. While she had expected that, she had wished it wouldn’t be like that. “Try at the Hog’s Head, I’m sure you will be just fine there.”

She nodded, even if she knew it was not true. She had been there in her sixth year, and she had seen the shadiness of the clientele there. Maybe that was what she needed.

She only received grunts and a rusty key for a tiny room with a tiny bed. She smiled at Aberforth, Dumbledore’s brother, only to receive another groan. With a sigh, she settled to sleep. Time travel is, apparently, exhausting.


	3. Chapter 3

It was a week later, Hermione was sleeping in her bedroom, when she noticed she was not alone. Her sleep had become extra light in the war, so something as quiet as another person breathing, made her body tense. She had her wand underneath her pillow, another thing that came with war, and with a fast move, she grabbed it and pointed it to the other person.

The person in the room was Dumbledore, younger than he was in her time but not by much, his hear and his beard were still white as snow. She started lowering her wand, and that made the man smile.

“I have heard you are in need of my school, Miss Granger,” Dumbledore said, as she sat up in the bed.

“Yes, Sir. I am here to defeat the dark lord. Thank you for coming to hear me out.” She refrained to say that he could have knocked or waited for her in the tavern, as people did not always sleep with clothes – she was glad she did.

“Of course, dear. Professor McGonagall told me you wanted to be turn into a student, first or second year. I’m sorry but I fail to see how could that defeat Voldemort.”

She saw the twinkle in his eyes when she didn’t flinch at the name, but she was too busy trying to come up with something believable while not telling him the truth. When she had been given the Time Turner on her third year, she had been warned about the rules. Now, she was about to break all the rules.

“I am a Seer,” she said, keeping her cringe internally. “I know things, horrible things that will happen if I don’t stop him. I know about your Order. I know about the war that is nearing. And the one that fill follow it. Professor Dumbledore, I need to stop it.”

He stayed silent, looking at her in a way that made her want to curl up in a ball like a kid, but she didn’t, she stayed with her back straight and her eyes fixed in the older man’s.

“There will be the moment where this is our only chance. Don’t ruin it, Albus.”

“You are just eighteen years old, definitely too young to be thinking about a war you don’t know its coming.” He really seemed to mean it. It was funny, Hermione thought, as Dumbledore didn’t think all those things when she had met him in her timeline. He had not doubted of sending Harry to war.

“I know it is coming. I know war is war. I may be too young, but I have already suffered because of this whole situation. I am ready to sacrifice myself if it stops Voldemort.” Her voice was steady, and her eyes clear. She knew what she was saying was true. She knew she would give anything to see the victims of the war not being victims.

 “What year do you wish to go to Hogwarts as?” Dumbledore asked, surprising her. This man was either too trusting or really cunning.

“I have seen names, I’m guessing I’ll have to be their year, just to see what do those names mean.” Dumbledore nodded as if it made sense. “James Potter. Sirius Black. Remus Lupin. Severus Snape. Lily Evans… Peter Pettigrew.”

Dumbledore frowned slightly before he nodded. “Those are all first years. Are you sure, Miss Granger that you would like to go through the seven years of education at Hogwarts? Do you really think it will help you?”

Hermione remembered the diadem and nodded. “It will, sir. I may be able to save some young lives, too.”

“You told Minerva that you were in an Order mission, but you haven’t tried to tell us both the same lie,” he pointed out.

“I know how a witch like Minerva McGonagall feels about the science of divination,” she answered, again, cringing inwardly. “I needed her to trust me enough to send you, and there is no one she trusts more than you.”

Dumbledore nodded as if he had expected that answer, and then he stood up. “If you are ready, we will be going to the castle now, Miss Granger.”

She was surprised, but she tried to hide it as he grabbed the bag where she kept the few things she had had bought, such as clothes. She grabbed her wand and stood besides Dumbledore.

“I think it will be best if you take the potion here,” he said, handing her a vial of the green potion. She drank it all in one big gulp, which made her cringe. It tasted sour, and when it reached her stomach, it seemed to be boiling. It was soon that she started to experience the effects of the potion, and a second later, she stood in clothes too big for her. “All set, then,” Dumbledore said.

Then, he started walking.

By the time they had reached the castle, Hermione’s stomach was knotted. Seeing the castle without a single damage made her want to cry. But she stood straight and followed Dumbledore through the doors.

“The morning classes have already started, of course, and you still need to be sorted,” she made a face, “I know you are here on business, Miss Granger, but the school has its rules.” She nodded. “I’ll speak with the teachers at lunch and explain your situation. You should think of something, Miss Granger, as I don’t think it would be wise to tell everyone about your mission.”

“Dead parents, I ran away, you just found me. That’s why I’m late to school,” she said immediately. She had had a week to think about something, and that was simple enough that it made sense.

Dumbledore seemed surprised, but after a moment, he just smiled and nodded, “very well.”

The older wizard guided her to what she knew was the Headmaster’s office, it was a big, circular room, full of different artifices and even a few plants. Her gaze fell into a shelve, where sat the Sorting Hat. Before she knew it, Dumbledore had placed the hat in her head, and then the mental conversation started.

 _“You are definitely a complicated one,” the hat said. “I will place you in Gryffindor, I see that, but your actions seem cunning… Lying to the most powerful wizard… You want to prove yourself, too…”_ The hat whispered inside her head.

“Gryffindor,” she muttered.

_“Are you certain? You could do great things in the snake house… Great things, indeed.”_

“I could do great things in Gryffindor, too.”

After a moment of silence, where certainly the hat would be digging in her brain, it talked again _“If you are so sure, little which, I shall sort you into the house of the brave – GRYFFINDOR!”_

The hat was out of her head before she could process things. She had almost been sorted to Slytherin… That was just mental.


	4. Chapter 4

It was lunch time, and Hermione’s plan was to sit alone and to go through her lunch as quickly as possible, but of course she should have known better. The moment she sat down on the table, she could feel everyone looking at her back, but she tried to ignore it. As long as nobody tried to talk to her, it would be alright.

Of course, that didn’t happen. She had started eating when she felt someone sitting next to her. When she raised her eyes, she saw it was a girl. She was maybe a sixth year, and she was looking at her curiously. Her hair was black, and her eyes brown and a square jaw. “Who are you?” She asked.

“My name is Hermione Granger, I just arrived at the school,” she answered.

“Why?”

Hermione frowned and ignored the question. She had an answer for it, the one she had given Dumbledore to tell the teachers, but this girl was being too rude. Hermione was mature enough to not deal with her shit.

“Are you going to answer?” The girl prompted, not dropping the rudeness on her tone.

“No.”

The girl groaned and stood up. She left without another word, and Hermione couldn’t help but laugh quietly, looking back at her food to try to hide it. She knew she wouldn’t have reacted this way if it had happened when she was really an eleven-year-old girl, but the de aging potion had, obviously, not affected her behavior.

“Don’t worry about Amelia, she’s a little bit harsh, but she’s not that bad,” someone said, next to her.

When she raised her eyes again, she saw another set of brown eyes. She didn’t have to stare at him too much to realize it was James Potter. He didn’t remember her, as she had obliviated him, but he was still smiling at her.

“Yeah, she’s better than any Slytherin,” another boy said. This time, it was Sirius who talked.

She smiled nonchalantly and tried to continue her lunch, but she was interrupted after just a couple of minutes by Remus. “What’s your name?”

“Hermione,” she answered, not raising her eyes.

“My name is Remus,” the boy answered, “these are my friends, Sirius and James. We have another friend, Peter, but he went to our room to get his potions book, you’ll meet him when he comes back.”

She nodded, she could feel her body stiffen at the mention of Pettigrew, but tried to hide it.

“Are you also a first year?” Sirius asked, eyeing her up.

“Yes,” she answered, not looking at him in the eyes.

She and Sirius hadn’t been exactly close in her timeline, but she had saved his life in third year, and she had spent Christmas at his house. It hurt to see him, knowing he was going to end up dead. It hurt to see them all, young and alive, none of them knowing the horrors future held for them.

“Why did you come so late? It’s November.”

She heard a tiny gasp and saw Remus shove Sirius. “You don’t have to answer that,” he said, “you didn’t answer Bones when she asked, and we don’t expect you to tell us but don’t kick us out, please.”

She frowned, “I won’t, but why don’t you want me to?”

“You’re alone and…” James started saying.

“Scratch that,” Sirius interrupted, “everyone is wondering about you, if you walk away from us, everyone will think we said something wrong and they will hate us. Specially Evans.”

Hermione laughed “maybe then you shouldn’t have said that,” she answered, before she got up with the intention to leave.

James –being the one sat next to her–, grabbed her wrist. “Sirius is an idiot, we don’t think that.” He gave his friend a pointed look.

“Everyone is wondering about you, though,” said Remus, “and we didn’t want you to sit here alone and feel like an experiment or anything.” She frowned at that, “You know, with everyone just looking at you,” he explained.

She nodded and sat again. “I didn’t come here in September because I ran away from my house and Dumbledore just found me.”

The boys didn’t ask anything more, probably guessing it was a touchy subject for her, and she was glad, because it would seem suspicious if she talked about her parents’ murder without crying, and she didn’t know how to fake crying.

“Look, there is Peter,” Sirius said, waving at someone who had just walked into the room. Hermione turned, and a gasp escaped from her throat. Peter Pettigrew was a blond, eleven-year-old boy, grinning excitedly at his friends while he made his way towards them.

“Pete, this is Hermione,” James said, as the fourth boy sat next to Sirius.

“Hello, there,” he answered.

She was surprised by how innocent he looked. He looked young, too. By the time they had first met, he looked middle-aged, even if he had been thirty at the time. Now, he had a mat of brown hair in his head and his eyes were also brown, but more importantly, they were shining.

“I… I have to go,” she mumbled. She couldn’t look at that boy, knowing what he was going to become.

“Oh, come on, Hermione, you haven’t even eaten…” James said.

“It’s quite alright.”

She didn’t add anything before she left, still horrified. Peter was just a boy, but just thinking about what he was going to become, made her mad. It made her want to hex him. To even kill him. But how would she explain having killed an innocent, eleven-year-old? She shook her head and headed towards the library.

How would she deal with Pettigrew? Dealing with Voldemort was half easy because she had the upper hand in it, and he had no idea who she was or what she was doing. But Pettigrew… He was just a kid, but if she didn’t deal with him as a kid, he would grow to be the disgusting adult she had met… It crossed her mind that she could be good to him, good enough that he didn’t even think of going to the dark side, but then she realized that it wouldn’t stop it. James and Lily had treated him as family, they had trusted him with not only their lives but also Harry’s. Sirius and Remus had been his loyal friends. Sirius had said it in the Shrieking Shak, they would have died for him. If that hadn’t stopped Peter from going to The Dark Lord, Hermione’s friendship wouldn’t either, even if she was able to stomach her disgust towards him.


	5. Chapter 5

Her first class at Hogwarts in her second first year was transfiguration, with Professor McGonagall. The witch’s eyes twinkled with acknowledgement when she saw her, but she didn’t say anything to her.

 “As many of you have noticed, we have a new student here, this is Miss Hermione Granger. Yes, she is new. Yes, she was sorted by the Sorting Hat in Gryffindor. No, you may not ask any questions to her in my class. Now, I’d like to continue with our first practice.”

The class continued without any more trouble, and Hermione was glad that McGonagall had acted like that. She didn’t want to get any more attention than what she was already getting.

She was getting out of the room when she was basically assaulted by a group of girls. “How is it that you’re new?” one of them asked excitedly.

“Yeah, I thought they didn’t accept anyone that didn’t arrive to the Platform on the first of September,” another one added.

Before she could answer with a rude remark, another voice did it for her, “it’s obvious, she was out there fighting evil,” James said, with a smirk.

Hermione was a little weirded out to see someone who looked so much like Harry with a face expression so different to anything the boy had ever showed. Maybe Harry was wrong, maybe his father _did_ strut, for an eleven-year-old, that smirk was enough to show it.

“Yes, definitely fighting evil,” she answered, smiling. It was scarily true.

The girls asked more questions on their way to their final class of the day, Defense Against the Dark Arts. Hermione was excited, maybe she would finally have a good education in the subject, unlike she had in her timeline. In the end, the class wasn’t so bad, for a first year, but Hermione’s level was rather high, so everything they did in the class, she had already known.

“Why do you seem so bored?” James asked.

He had sat next to her as soon as they had arrived to the room, not even bothered to look out for his friends. Sirius had mocked being hurt, and before Professor Trowner walked into the class, Hermione had heard him saying “Of course he has left me for a pretty girl… Life is unfair, Remus… Unfair!”

Hermione had found it funny, but at the same time, it had made her heart ache. She couldn’t let this goofy, innocent men die so horribly. She had to save them.

“I know all of this stuff,” she answered, mindlessly drawing patterns in the table with her finger. James looked at her curiously and then she sat up straighter. “I read a lot about magic,” she said at his silent question.

He nodded, not seeming one bit suspicious. She was dealing with eleven-year-olds, and they were all too innocent to even imagine someone lying about something as simple as their knowledge of DADA.

When the classed was finished, she had planned to go to the library and start planning Voldemort’s defeat. However, the Marauders caught up with her. She supposed she shouldn’t call them that, not yet at least.

“Hermione,” Sirius smiled at her, it was a bright smile, no hunted eyes. She had to look away. “Do you want to join us in our masterplan?”

She frowned. “Your masterplan will be ruined if you’re planning to let anyone you know for two hours join.”

“Is that a no?” James asked, smiling too.

It hurt.

“Yes. I’m going to go to the library. Don’t get into too much trouble,” she said, “and don’t go near Slughorn’s potion cupboard.”

The boys blanched at that, and she smiled. “How did you know that?” Peter asked her.

“I’m a Seer,” Hermione replied, not sparing him a second glance. “And what I’m not seeing is you without a detention at the end of the day.”

The boys giggled and made their way somewhere she didn’t know. Maybe the common room. Before they could get too far, they stopped, the talked and they looked at her. Then, Peter walked towards her position and said “do you know how to get to the library? Do you want us to show you the way?”

She was surprised. Peter Pettigrew, traitor, coward, a horrible person, was offering her his help to get to the library. They all thought she had never been to the castle before, and it made sense that they wanted to help, but it was Peter who was offering… Her stomach tightened. She shook her head, feeling the vile coming up her throat.

“I’ll be fine,” she managed to let out.

Before he could say anything else, she turned sharply and left. Hermione made her way to the library, where she grabbed as many books that talked about curses as she could find, and started to study Fiendfyre. She needed to control it to destroy the horcruxes, as she wasn’t going to go down to the Chamber of the Secrets and kill the basilisk for it, and she also doubted she could get her hands to Gryffindor’s Sword.

It was already dark when Madam Pince found her. “If you don’t want to skip dinner, go now,” she said, not even caring that she hadn’t seen Hermione before.

The girl was surprised to find that the woman looks pretty much as she does in her own timeline. Her skin was still parchment-like, and while she looked younger, her sunk cheeks made her look middle-aged.

She was right, and when Hermione arrived at the Great Hall, she found that everyone was already eating. She sat alone and started to eat only to be interrupted by another girl sitting next to her. When she looked up, she found brown eyes looking at her excitedly. “I’m so glad I finally found you alone,” she said.

Hermione frowned, “excuse me?”

“My name is Marlene McKinnon,” she said, and while it did ring a bell, Hermione couldn’t place it. “I’m a first-year too, I’m guessing we will be sharing a room. Maybe I can show you when you are done eating?”

Hermione smiled at her. “My name is Hermione Granger. And I would like that very much.”

She had never clicked with the girls from their year, and maybe that was because most of them were only interested because she was Harry’s friend. Hermione hadn’t felt like she needed them, back in her timeline, but having friends could not go wrong. Maybe, if she befriended someone she didn’t need to save, her shoulders would feel lighter.

Just like Marlene had said, when they finished their dinner, they went to the common room. In their way there, Marlene told her all she knew about Hogwarts, some real stuff and some rumors that were probably fake. Hermione nodded along and tried to act surprised, but she already knew all the things the girl was saying.

“The girls in our room are nice, so you don’t have to worry,” Marlene said, stopping before the painting of the Fat Lady. “We will all be good friends.”

Even if Hermione doubted that, she nodded.

Marlene said the password and they both walked into the room. Hermione was surprised to find it pretty much the same as it was in her own time. Marlene walked towards a group of girls who were giggling and whispering, and Hermione groaned inwardly. She hadn’t wanted to put up with eleven-year-old gossiping when she had been eleven years old herself, and she most definitely didn’t feel like it now.

“Guys, this is Hermione,” Marlene said, pulling her alongside with her as she sat.

Hermione looked at the group and found the red hair she was looking for. Lily Evans was beautiful, even at the age of eleven, Hermione decided. Her skin was pale, which made the green in her eyes pop out. She also had beautiful freckles scattered across her face.

The other three girls, Hermione didn’t recognize.

“These are Lily,” Marlene pointed at her, “Amelia,” the girl being pointed smiled at her, she had blue eyes and curly blond hair, nothing like the other Amelia she had met today; “Julia,” this girl was like Lavender, Hermione realized with horror, she saw it in the smile she was sporting; “and Mary,” her hair was brown, and her eyes were greenish, even though they weren’t nearly as bright as Lily’s.

“Nice to meet you all.”

“We’ve seen you parading with Potter and his friends,” the girl like Lavender said. In that moment, Hermione knew she hadn’t been wrong. “Isn’t it a little bit weird that they want to get you into their lame gang?”

Hermione raised her eyebrows. “They are just being nice.”

Lily snorted. “James and Sirius don’t know the meaning to that word, Hermione, the sooner you realize that, the better.”

That made Hermione frown. Harry had told her that his mother had pretty much ignored James until their seventh year, but to hear her sound so hating after knowing them for such a little time… It made her feel uncomfortable.

“I think you are wrong,” she said, getting up. “I better get some sleep; this day has been exhausting.”


	6. Chapter 6

Hermione thought she would have been friends with Lily, as the girl proved to have some of her treats, but as days passed, she realized that they just didn’t click. It was the day before Christmas when Mary pointed it out.

They were in the Common Room, playing muggle chess while the other girls in their room were gossiping somewhere, and the Marauders, as usual, were pranking someone. Probably the Slytherins, Hermione thought.

“Lily and you don’t like each other much, right?”

Hermione looked up, surprised. They hadn’t talked much. They never did when they were playing chess, as both were extremely competitive and talking would only distract them and stop them from wining.

“I suppose we don’t,” she answered, shrugging.

“Why?”

Hermione moved her horse, and looked up again. “I don’t know. I guess we just… don’t click.”

“Is it because you fancy James?”

That question startled Hermione so much that she jumped and made the board fall. Mary looked up at her with a frown.

“I do not fancy James,” Hermione said, horrified. She liked him just fine, and she thought he was a great friend and a good boy, but he was still her friend’s father, and she did not fancy her friend’s father.

“Okay,” answered Mary, setting the board up again.

After a second, Hermione started helping her. There was a moment of silence and then Hermione spoke again, the frown still not gone from her face. “Why did you think I liked James like that?”

Mary smiled at her and moved a pawn. “For starters, you are always with him and his friends, and whenever Lily says something against them, you start acting all weird.”

“That’s because Lily talks about things she doesn’t get,” Hermione answered, rolling her eyes. “And I spend time with them because they have been nice to me since I arrived here. Also, they are always coming to me, not the other way around. Maybe it’s one of them who fancies me.”

Mary smiled in a way that seemed a lot like a smirk. “Maybe. I’m sure it’s Remus.”

Hermione shook her head and started to play again, this time in silence. She hadn’t gone back in time to talk about boys with Mary Macdonald. Her research was going well, but she still needed a place to practice with fiendfyre without risking hurting anybody. Then, the thought hit her like a Bludger. The Room of Requirement.

“Mary, I’m really sorry but I need to go,” she said, getting up.

The other girl pouted, “but we were playing…”

“I know, I’m sorry, I just remembered I need to talk with Dumbledore. I should be back for dinner. If not, you need to tell McGonagall that I required something and that she should check that I’m alright, okay?”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Mary started to say.

“Please, Mary.”

“Yeah, okay, alright.”

Hermione bolted out of the Common Room and rushed up to the tapestry of Barnabas the Barny, she walked past it three times, thinking about what she wanted, and then she got into the room. The room was empty, and big. She took a big gulp of air, and started her practice.

By the time she decided to finish her practice, she was not only sweating, but she had also burnt the side of her hand. She needed to find a counter course more effective than _partis temporis_ if she wanted to get out of the room alive next time she tried.

When she arrived at the Great Hall, dinner had just started. She searched around the room until her eyes found Mary, who was looking at her relieved. Hermione started walking towards her, but her path was soon interrupted by Sirius Black. She was still surprised at how young he looked, how unbothered.

“You weren’t in the Common Room,” he said, “we wanted to show you something, but you weren’t there. Where were you?”

“At the library,” she answered. She was used to lying, and it was for a good cause, so it didn’t bother her as much as it would do in any other situation.

Sirius frowned, “we also looked there.”

Hermione snorted, “then you are really bad at it,” she said, “what did you want to show me?”

As she had expected, his worries completely disappeared. It surprised him how gullible eleven-year-olds were. He pushed her towards where James, Remus and Peter were sitting, and she sat with them.

“We found a secret passage,” James said, whispering. She could see the twinkle of excitement in his eyes, and when she looked at the other boys, their eyes were shining too.

“Don’t tell me, beneath the one-eyed witch,” she said rolling her eyes.

“No, actually, do you think there is one there too?” Remus asked, basically his whole body was vibrating.

Hermione realized her mistake and suppressed a groan, “I’ve heard rumors. Where is the one you found?”

“Behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy,” James answered.

“Were does it lead?” Of course, she already knew that it led to Hogsmeade, but she was expected to ask that, it was what anyone would have asked, she thought.

The boys shrugged. “We haven’t gone yet. We will try tomorrow, when we have time. Do you want to come?”

Hermione shook her head, “I have a lot to study, and so do you, boys. You are too focused on your pranks.”

She grabbed her fork without thinking much about it and flinched when it touched the burnt skin in her hand. The boys took notice of that, and gave her a look that made it clear that she was not going to get out of it without explaining what had happened.

“I burnt my hand a little while practicing charms,” Hermione explained, grimacing.

“Let me see,” James grabbed her hand and she saw them all looking at it with worried expressions. Even Peter. She pulled her hand back and hided it beneath the table.

“You should go to the Hospital Wing,” Peter said, frowning up at her.

“I’m okay,” she snapped.

“Yeah, tell that to your extra crispy hand,” Sirius snapped back.

She took a breath and closed her eyes. “I am not going to go to the Hospital Wing,” she said. “I just need to cast a couple of healing spells and it will be alright.”

“We know you’re smart, Hermione, but I think it will be best if you went to see Madam Pomfrey,” Remus argued.

She wanted to ditch them and go to her room. She was tired and snappy, but at the same time she needed to be with people. “Let’s talk about something else, boys, please,” she said, lowering her eyes enough that she looked troubled.

“My dad told me my mom wanted to send me a Howler for not spending Christmas at home,” Peter said after a minute, starting another conversation, and even if it killed her a little, Hermione looked at him, grateful.


	7. Chapter 7

Christmas passed in a blur, Hermione did more research about Fiendfyre and the possible counter curses, while also managing to do all the work her professors had given them for the Christmas vacation. In no time, they were back to classes, and she was more tired than she should have been, as she spent most of her free time reading books she shouldn’t be reading. At least her essays didn’t take as long as they used to do in her first first-year, as she already knew all the stuff she was writing about.

Still, it got to the point that her exhaustion was such that she woke up in the hospital wing only to be told that she had fainted in potion class. Madam Pomfrey told her to get more sleep and eat better, as she seemed to be starving herself. She also told her she had healed her hand, and she promised not to tell anyone when Hermione had faked embarrassment. “Everyone says I’m smart, but I burnt myself with a spell as simple as an _incendio_.”

She had been forced to stay at the hospital wing for one day and two nights, without visits, so she would rest well. After it, she resumed her classes, and everyone in her house seemed worried about her, but Slytherins had taken a like in mocking her, faking to faint whenever they saw her.

“Don’t pay them any attention,” her friends usually said.

Hermione wasn’t bothered by the mocks, actually. She was bothered by having to be with someone all the time. The Marauders had decided that she could not go to the library if it wasn’t with one of them or one of the girls. She had fought against it, trying to sneak out without them seeing, but they were smarter than what she gave them credit for, and they always caught her. With them following her around like dogs, she didn’t find any time to either research or practice again, so she settled for doing school work and reading whatever Remus recommended her.

“It’s been like three weeks, can’t you lot just leave me alone?” Hermione had finally snapped when they were in the Common Room.

“No,” was the only answer she got.

The next time she asked, was a week later, and when she got another negative answer she just growled and sent them a _petrificus totalus_. She was later sent to detention when Professor Flitwick found them there. The incident was reported to Dumbledore, who made her go to his office immediately.

“You are here in order to accomplish a very important task, Miss Granger, you are not here to harm my students.” She was sure that if she had been any other student, he would be amused by the whole situation, but she was not any other student.

Still, she scoffed. It shook her, to scoff at Dumbledore, a man she admired, a man she had seen dead. The Headmaster of Hogwarts. And she had scoffed at him. She did not back down, though. “Your students weren’t harmed, Professor. And that important task is being taken care of. However, those boys were being nothing but an impediment.”

“You will face the consequences as any other student would, Miss Granger, and the next time something like this happens, I will personally escort you out of the castle.”

“Understood, sir.”

When she had seen them next, getting out from the hospital wing, they had been mad at her. However, later that night when she had arrived to the Common Room after her detention, they had been there waiting for her, and their annoyance had seem to have passed.

“It was cool,” Sirius said, “like a badass move. Maybe we should try it on Snivellus.”

The other boys snickered, and Hermione punched Sirius’ arm. “You will not do such thing.”

Of course, they didn’t listen to her and Sirius and James ended up in detention with her. “Why is it just you two?” She had asked when she had seen them.

“Because Remus and Peter are believed to bee too innocent to have such attitude,” James answered.

“Also, Evans told McGonagall that it was our idea, as nobody would be as stupid to follow your stupid steps,” Sirius added, “I think she said stupid like at least three times.”

“My steps weren’t stupid,” Hermione frowned, thinking back to the red headed girl.

“She’s just too much of a goody two shoes,” Sirius answered shrugging.

After her detention period had ended, she celebrated her time without a bodyguard going to the Room of Requirement to practice again. It was difficult, and she ended up sweaty and a little bit burnt again, but she could see she had made some improvement. However, when she finished, she had missed dinner. Maybe in another life she wouldn’t have been bothered by the idea, but after spending months not knowing when her next meal was going to be in her horcrux hunt with Ron and Harry, she hadn’t taken food for granted.

When she arrived to the Common Room, she was bombarded with questions by Marlene and Mary, who dragged her to their girl circle. “I was in the library reading about dragons and I was so absorbed with my reading that I didn’t realized I had skipped dinner.”

“At least you weren’t reading about something as boring as math,” Marlene said, rolling her eyes comically.

“Math isn’t boring,” Hermione replied with a frown.

“Hermione!” When she looked up at whoever had yelled her name, she saw the Marauders walking into the Common Room, Sirius – he had been the one who had talked – was at the head of the group, “where the hell were you?”

“Reading. I’m sorry I missed dinner.”

“We brought you food,” James said, giving her a plate. It was some kind of soup that made her stomach growl loudly.

“Oh, thank you so much,” she said, she conjured a spoon and started to eat the food, then, when she looked up, she saw they were all watching her. “What?”

“If you keep doing that you’re going to end up in the hospital wing again,” Remus said.

“I’m okay, Remus,” she answered, smiling at her friend.

“Yes, Remus, she’s okay, just like she was when she burnt herself,” Sirius said, snappily. She heard a gasp from one of the girls, but she didn’t turn back to see who had it been. Instead, she fixed her eyes on Sirius’, and said “what do you want, Sirius? A fucking thank-you card or what?”

Now, she heard more gasps. Hermione had never been one to curse, but she was irritated at the kid, and she had slipped. Also, she kept forgetting she was supposedly eleven years old, and kids that young didn’t curse, right?

Sirius’ face was stony serious, and it was a look that didn’t fit him. “Yes, Hermione, exactly,” he said in a cold voice she had never heard being directed towards her, before he stalked off.


	8. Chapter 8

Hermione wasn’t thick enough to not realize that Sirius was avoiding her, so after a couple of days of complete silence from him, she did what she thought would be the boldest move ever. She also thought it was the way to win Sirius back. She was not wrong. They were at breakfast and Hermione made sure to be sat near the Marauders without sitting with them, and when the mail arrived, she tried to act nonchalantly. Of course, she couldn’t help but smile when she heard the barked laugh that Sirius let out when he saw the thank-you card with a tiny kitten that she had sent him.

“Well played, Granger,” he said, smiling warmly at her.

“Thank you, Black.”

After that moment, everything went back to normal. Of course, Hermione’s life was never normal. She was still training with the Fiendfyre, and she was becoming more and more desperate with it, not exactly getting the hang of it. She knew she should go to Dumbledore to seek help, but she didn’t want to. She was dealing with dark magic, and she knew it was her only option – she didn’t exactly feel like fighting a basilisk – but she feared Dumbledore wouldn’t see it like that. Maybe he would ban her from trying it again. So she kept it quiet and kept practicing alone, hiding. She often arrived at the Common Room burned and exhausted, but she kept repeating the list of horcruxes in her head – _Diary. Ring. Locket. Cup. Diadem. Snake_ – and that gave her the strength she needed to continue.

Once, when they were having lunch at the Great Hall, one of the older boys of their house, approached them and talked directly to Remus, “I’ve been meaning to ask you, Lupin, how did you get all those scars?”

Everyone near them felt quiet, as if they had all been wondering the same thing, and Remus’ discomfort was almost touchable. “He fought the meanest mummy two years ago, didn’t you know?” Hermione said, her eyes fixed with the boy’s. She felt Remus’ body turn to her. “He’s basically a hero,” she concluded, going back to her food.

After a couple of seconds, the boy left and the people around them, resumed their eating. “Thank you,” Remus said with a side smile.

“No, thank _you_ , mummy fighter,” she joked.

She saw Peter whisper something at James before the latter laughed quietly, “I’m pretty sure she’s joking around, Pete.”

They asked her to go to the library after their class were finished, but she decline, claiming that she needed to talk to McGonagall. That made them suspicious, “you plan of spending hours talking to the woman?” James asked.

Actually, she had planned to do some more research on Fiendfyre counter-curses from a book that she had stole from the library after Madam Pince had told her that the contents of the book were not adequate for first-years.

“Uhm… Actually, I’m on my period, and it hurts,” she said, knowing how eleven-year-olds were about periods. Their faces were proof enough that it was working. “My plan is to get into bed and try to read and relax, you know?”

 “Yes. Of course. Yes. Yes,” Remus answered, with a bright red face.

“Great. Don’t get in trouble, you know how Madam Pince is,” she said, “I’m going to go to the Hospital Wing to see if Pomfrey can give me something for the pain, bye.”

The boys said goodbye, their faces still red, and she snickered softly, going in the direction of the infirmary. She was actually on her period, and while she wasn’t having horrible cramps, a little tonic for the pain couldn’t do her wrong.

When she arrived at the Common Room, she found it full, and she immediately went to her dormitory. Before she reached the stairs, she saw Marlene and the other girls there, talking and laughing unconcernedly. She smiled at the sight.

It was not until a couple of hours later that Mary knocked the dormitory’s door and told her that James, Remus, Sirius and Peter were waiting at her in the Common Room. She groaned but when down with her anyways.

“C’mon, come with us to our room,” Sirius said, pulling at her hand in the stairs direction.

“What?” she frowned, “for what?”

She hadn’t gone to their room, after all, they had the Common Room to hang out. Hermione didn’t know why did they want to go there now.

When they arrived, Hermione wasn’t surprised to find that it wasn’t very different than her own room, maybe just a bit messier. All the beds were made, but they were rather sloppy, all but the one in the side, that was neatly made – she assumed it was Remus’. Hermione looked around, feeling a little bit weird.

“So… Why are we here, then?” Hermione asked, shifting her weigh from one foot to another.

“We didn’t want you alone, and there was too much noise in the Common Room, and my mother always gets headaches when she’s on her period, so we stole a lot of chocolate from the kitchen and we are throwing you a period party.” James answered, showing her the chocolates they had stolen from the kitchens.

“And what if I just want to curl up in bed?” She asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Then we let you use one of our beds,” Sirius answered.

She smiled sweetly, and sat in the floor. “You guys are adorable. Let’s have this period party, shall we?”

She tried to imagine doing this with Harry and Ron, but she couldn’t. That didn’t mean that they were worse friends, of course, but Hermione could feel that her friendship with the Marauders was definitely going to be different than her friendship with Harry and Ron, and she was excited to see where it would go.

Her throat went dry when Peter offered a candy bar, saying “these are my favorites.”

They spend the night talking, and the ended up falling asleep in the floor. The next morning, when Hermione woke up to Sirius snoring while resting his head in her shoulder, she smiled and woke them all. She would have to go to her room and change and she’d be late to breakfast, but the boys promised they would grab her a couple biscuits. She ate them in potions, trying to hide it from Slughorn, while she stirred the mix mindlessly.

That afternoon, in the Common Room, Mary carried her to the sofa where Marlene, Lily and Julia were sitting. “You didn’t come to the room last night,” she said accusingly.

“I’m aware,” Hermione answered, not wanting to deal with the typical eleven-year-old girl shit. She knew how girls could be at that age and she had had enough of that in her first time at Hogwarts.

“What were you doing?” Lily asked, “girls aren’t even allowed at the boy’s dormitories, much less to sleep.”

“We slept on the floor, Evans, there was no funny business, believe me.” She had momentarily forgotten that she was dealing with girls that didn’t even think about said _funny business_ , but their horrified faces reminded her. “Seriously, guys, we just ate and talked. It was nice.”

“And why couldn’t you do that in the Common Room?” Marlene asked with a frown, as if she was really wondering.

“There was too much noise and we wanted silence. Why are you guys so nosy anyways? Do you like any of the guys, or what?” She had added a teasing tone, which managed to change the direction of the conversation when the girls made disgusted noises and started to argue about the Marauder’s attractiveness. Of course, it backfired when she was asked her opinion.


	9. Chapter 9

Before she realized it, it was April and they were on break again. This time, both James and Peter went home, as did Mary, Marlene and Lily. This meant Julia was tagging along with her, Sirius and Remus, and while the boys didn’t seem to mind that much, it irritated Hermione greatly. The girl was always talking about stupid things, shouting, and touching them. It was something that Hermione had realized the first day of the break, Julia liked to touch the people she was talking to. She always grabbed Hermione’s arm, or touched Sirius’ arm, even once, she had patted Remus on the back out of nowhere.

Of course, with the finals only two months away, their professors had given them a lot of work, and they spent their days in the library. Hermione was always the first one to finish with her assignments, and she often tried to sneak out to practice more, but she wasn’t really successful. It was funny that she was more able to practice when she had classes than on vacation.

One time, when they were at the Great Hall having dinner, a boy approached them, and Hermione was ready to make up another excuse for Remus’ scars, when they boy sat next to her and smiled. “Hello, my name is Kirley Bott,” he said, his eyes still focused on her.

“Hello,” she answered, frowning. She noticed her friends had stopped talking, and were looking at them.

“Would you like to sit with my friends and I?” He asked, pointing at two boys sitting not too far from them.

“I’m already sitting with my friends,” she answered, pointing at them the same way he had just moments before.

“Maybe tomorrow, then,” the boy answered, not giving it up.

Hermione rolled her eyes. “I’ll be sitting with them tomorrow too. But thank you.”

When Kirley finally got up and left to sit with their friends, Hermione rolled her eyes and went back to her food.

“What was that?” Julia shrieked. “He’s a second-year, why would he want you to sit with him?”

“Good question,” Hermione said, ignoring the tone that Julia’s voice had.

“He likes you,” Sirius said. “I can’t believe Kirley Bott likes you.”

She was starting to get offended, even if she couldn’t care less about that boy, why were they all so surprised? “And why is that exactly?”

“Because he’s a jerk!” Remus answered for Sirius, and the black-haired boy nodded.

“He’s always making fun of everyone.”

Hermione snorted, “I don’t think you two should be saying that. You make fun of everyone.”

“No, we prank everyone, but we are not like Bott.”

Throughout the Easter break Hermione started to see Kirley Bott everywhere, and she when she kept ignoring him and his attempts to get her attention, he started to grow bitter. When James and Peter were back, they were in the Common Room as always when James asked, “what’s Bott’s problem? He hasn’t stopped looking at us for the whole afternoon.”

“He’s not looking at us, dear James,” Sirius answered, and his arm snaked around Hermione’s shoulders, “he’s looking at her.”

Marlene and Mary, who were sitting with them for a change, looked at her, surprised. “You and Kirley Bott?” Marlene asked.

“Kirley Bott, alone, thank you very much,” she had answered irritated. "Also, I am not even thinking about boys, too young for that too." Hermione couldn't remember any first year thinking about boys in her time, she certainly didn't do so. 

James let out a loud laugh, “he has a crush, huh?” He sat closer to her and smiled, looking at her eyes. Hermione frowned and pulled away from him.

“How can your mind work like that?” she asked, “you are just eleven,” she said without thinking.

The boys just laughed at her.

The next time Bott sat next to her in the Great Hall, he made fun of her hair. She reckoned that if she had really been eleven, she would have ran away crying, but words didn’t have that effect on her anymore.

She was going to answer coldly, but she didn’t need to, because her boys were there to do it for her. “What’s your problem, mate?” Sirius barked, “one day you are after her and the next you make fun of her?”

“Yeah, that’s not cool,” Peter agreed. As usual, her heart twisted.

“You know what it’s not cool? That I have to look at her ugly face.”

As soon as he finished the sentence, both James and Sirius jumped to their feet, seeming ready to punch the boy. However, they stopped when they heard Hermione’s laugh.

“You’re going to have to work on those come backs,” she said, nonchalantly. “I’ll let you try to hurt me in a couple years if you promise to practice.”

After that, Hermione gained a reputation of being sassy, even if she didn’t say anything like that again. Kirley did not bother her again after that, and she was pretty sure he was avoiding her, maybe fearing another verbal confrontation, from which she would come out as the winner. Boys have weak egos like that.

It was around that time when she had her first nightmare.

Harry was dead, and Voldemort was now the ruler of Great Britain, he was not going to stop there, of course, but for the time being, he spent his time fixing society to make it be the way he liked it. He had imprisoned or killed every muggleborn witch and wizard, and he was doing the same with blood traitors. In her dream, Ron and his family were being burned alive. She could see every wound, every bruise, and that was proof enough to know they had been tortured.

“You left,” Ron had said, his voice raspy and broken, and it made her stomach twist unpleasantly. “You left us to suffer alone.”

She woke up screaming and crying, when Marlene tried to comfort her, she was pushed. Hermione felt like she couldn’t breathe, and in the back of her head, a voice told her that she was having a panic attack.

The next time she woke up, she was in the Hospital Wing, and when she made it to breakfast, she knew everyone had heard of it by the way the eyed her. Her friends didn't mention it, and she was glad. She didn’t know what she could answer if they asked about it. After Transfiguration class, McGonagall asked her to stay behind.

“I heard about what happened yesterday,” she said, once they were alone. “Do you need a dreamless sleep potion?”

Hermione looked at the witch with a small smile and shook her head, “no, thank you, Professor. I’ll be alright.”

The older woman nodded gravely, “feel free to ask for it if you need it, Miss Granger.”

When her friends asked what had McGonagall wanted, she just shrugged and told them that she was worried and that she had tried to talk to her like a psychologist, after explaining to Sirius and James what a psychologist was, she added “it was just a dream, anyways, I don’t see why she’s so worried.”


	10. Chapter 10

Her nightmares didn’t stop there. Sometimes she dreamed about the consequences of her leaving, others, she dreamed about the things that had happened in the war. She had had to put a silencing charm in her bed every night, just in case. She didn’t have nightmares every day, but they were frequent enough to scare her roommates.

“You should go talk with Madam Pomfrey,” Marlene suggested one day.

After two weeks of complete exhaustion because of her bad nights, she agreed. However, she didn’t go to Madam Pomfrey, but to Professor McGonagall, who looked at her pitifully before giving her the potion.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“Don’t let your demons get the best of you,” the woman said. Even if she was younger than how Hermione had used to know her, in that moment she seemed exactly like the woman Hermione had left.

That night, she took the potion and started to feel sleepy almost instantly. She made it to her bed, but when she woke the next morning, she found that she was still wearing her clothes from last night. She had woken up before any of the girls, and she used the extra time to shower and make herself presentable. Even with the potion, Hermione found the traces of tiredness in her face when she looked at the mirror.

When she made her way to the Common Room, her roommates hadn’t woken up yet, nobody seemed to be up, one look at the clock told her why. It was well before seven, and not even the Great Hall was open yet. To her surprise, the first known face she saw coming down the stairs was Sirius. She had been reading a book until he let himself fall next to her in the sofa. “How can you be reading at this ungodly hour?” He asked.

Hermione smiled. “I didn’t have a ton of other options, did I? I’ve been up for almost an hour now. Plus, some of us actually enjoy reading.”

“Yes, I know, and I will never understand,” he said, even if she had seen him reading his own books. She didn’t comment on it. “How about we go get some breakfast?” He suggested. He got up before she answered, and she followed him out of the Common Room.

When they reached the Great Hall, there were hardly twenty people, including professors, there. Sirius and she made their way to the Gryffindor table and sat there, silently serving themselves. They were talking about the DADA professor when Lily and Mary sat with them. That made Sirius frown, later, he told her he didn’t have anything against them, but they just didn’t belong to the same groups. Hermione had almost snorted.

When the rest of the Marauders came to the Great Hall to see Sirius having breakfast with Mary Macdonald, Lily Evans and Hermione Granger, they rushed to his help. Finally, Marlene and Julia arrived, but they were so late that they almost missed breakfast.

“How did you sleep?” Marlene asked, and while she was trying to be secretive, everyone know what she was talking about. She had been the only one to acknowledge that matter, too, not even Sirius had commented on it, and he was usually the one who knew no limits.

“I slept well,” she answered, even if she still felt tired. Hermione guessed that not waking up in the middle of a panic attack, being barely able to breathe was sleeping well, at least for her standards.

“Then the potion worked?” Mary asked, apparently curious as well.

“Yes,” Hermione answered, not sharply, but the monosyllable answer was enough to let them know she didn’t want to talk about it. Even Lily dropped the subject, even if her eager face expression let Hermione know that it didn’t please her to do so.

She had the same conversation with McGonagall later. The witch told her to go to her whenever she ran out of the potion, and warned her that, while she wouldn’t be experiencing any nightmares as long as she took the potion, she wouldn’t be as rested as she would be with natural sleep.

Before she realized it, they were two weeks away from their exams, and Remus was fidgety and pale, even more than the rest of them, and one day he was feeling so bad, he hadn’t even been able to attend the class. Of course, it was not the first time this happened, but being so near the exams, Hermione made sure to take extensive notes for him to copy later. It was only that night that she realized that it was the full moon what had caused him to feel so bad. The next morning, she sneaked into the Hospital Wing and found him sleeping, he had some sort of salve in his scrawny chest, probably meant to cure the injuries he had self-inflicted. Hermione forced herself to hold back the pity she was feeling, and left the notes from all their classes in the beside table, she also left him a chocolate candy bar she sneakily kind of had stolen from an older Gryffindor.

That day, Remus didn’t go to class either, and again, Hermione took notes for him, and once school was finished for the day, she went back to the infirmary. She didn’t find Remus there, but she did at the boys’ dormitory. She handed him the notes, and he smiled tiredly at her. Then, she dragged Sirius and Peter out of the room, James being in detention, and told him to sleep until he felt better.

“He’s been sleeping the whole day, Hermione,” Sirius whined, “he doesn’t need more sleep. He’s going to melt into the bed.”

“I don’t know mate,” interrupted Peter, “he seemed to be really sick.”

“He was. He was also tired, so he’ll sleep as much as he wants to,” Hermione said, looking at Sirius pointedly. “Meanwhile, we are going to study. Exams are almost here.”

Sirius whined again, and not for the first time, he was the bratty kid Hermione had expected him to be when she had met him in the future. It did irritate her, but to some levels, it also endeared her. Thirty years old Sirius was too hunted, too different to the kid Hermione was living with now. “Exams are still like two weeks away.”

“Yeah, two weeks you should expend studying. Come on.”

No matter how much Sirius groaned and whined in their way, they went to the library and studied for a couple of hours. In their way back to the Gryffindor Common Room, they met with James, who complained about how dirty Slughorn’s cauldrons were, and how wrong was it to make students clean them.

The next day, Remus went to class, but he was still weak enough to need some help from his friends, specially when he had to get up from his chair. She had seen a kid with greasy hair that could be no one other than Severus Snape teasing him, trying to get a reaction. Of course, he got one, getting James and Sirius punished again. That left it to Hermione and Peter to help Remus get up all the stairs until he was safely tucked in his bed.

“You should sleep some more, but I know you’re not going to, so we’re going to hang out here instead of the Common Room. It’s too loud and too uncomfortable,” Hermione declared. At some point, Sirius and James made it back from their detention and joined the other three at their room. Again, they fell asleep before Hermione could get back to her room. When she woke up the next day, she was grateful that no nightmares had plagued her sleep.


	11. Chapter 11

It was not surprising for her that she passed all her classes with great marks, the best in all her classes, really, but she supposed that didn’t really count, as it was the second time she was going through the course. On the day before the Leaving Feast, everyone spent as much of the night as they could in the Common Room.

“You are all just going to be tired tomorrow and accomplish nothing,” Hermione told them, after voicing her intentions of going to her bed and actually get some sleep.

“You can’t leave!” James said, he was frowning at her and it reminded her so much of Harry that she had to look away before she started to cry.

“Yeah, tomorrow summer will start, and we won’t be seeing each other for a long time,” Sirius added and surprisingly, he was looking at her with complete seriousness, “tonight is our time to say goodbye.”

“We can say goodbye tomorrow,” she answered, even if she felt slowly craving.

“Yes, but it won’t be the same. Please, Hermione,” James said, attracting her gaze again.

Of course, Hermione ended agreeing, and by the time she and the others went to bed, the sun was peaking. It had been a good night, fun. Hermione realized only then how much would she be missing them on summer. She hadn’t expected herself to become so attached to the boys, but now that she thought about it, she hadn’t exactly run away from them. With a tired laugh, she realized that she had run away the first time they had talked, but after that, she hadn’t.

The next day, she woke up before her roommates, just like she had been doing since she had started taking the potions, but instead of waiting for Sirius, who also woke up early every day, she went to see the Headmaster. Only when she was in Dumbledore’s office, did she realize that she didn’t know the password to get in. Then, she realized that even if she knew it, Dumbledore was not likely to be up yet.

When she arrived back to the Common Room, she found Sirius already there, “where were you?” He asked, when he saw her enter through the portrait of the Fat Lady.

“I wanted to talk with Dumbledore, but then I realized it’s too early,” she explained, at his inquiring face, she doubted. “I wanted to ask him if I could stay here this summer,” she finally confided, “I don’t… I don’t have anywhere to stay.”

Sirius didn’t press the matter, and they settled in the couch, waiting for their friends to wake up. They were silent, and it was surprisingly comfortable. Older Sirius wasn’t too good with silence, but Hermione could understand that nobody would be after twelve years in a place like Azkaban. Marlene’s arrival shook her from her thoughts, for what she was grateful. Eventually, everyone was at the Common Room, and they made their way to the Great Hall. Hermione could sense it was the last day at Hogwarts, everyone was excitedly spending time with as many people as they could, and she had caught a couple of seventh-years crying about loosing their friends.

“What are your plans this summer?” Peter asked just before stuffing a cherry scone in his mouth.

The first to answer the question had been James, who excitedly explained that he would be going to France. He was barely finished with his tale when Hermione saw Dumbledore walk into the Great Hall. She got up and walked fast towards the Headmaster.

“I’d like to stay here during summer,” she said without any preambles.

Dumbledore didn’t look really surprised, his eyes were twinkling underneath his halfmoon glasses. “I supposed you would.”

“I will continue with my mission in the meantime,” she said. She didn’t suppose she seemed really serious, after all, she had the appearance of an eleven-year-old.

“Inside Hogwarts?” The Headmaster asked, this had caught his curiosity.

She didn’t skip a beat, “I’m still in the researching stages of it, Professor.”

Hermione didn’t know when had she learnt to lie like that, but she was glad she had, because Dumbledore nodded, still thoughtful, but seeming to have believed her. “Very well,” he finally said, “you may stay here, Miss Granger. I expect no trouble from you.”

She half smiled at the Headmaster and made her way back to the table, where she received the curious looks of her friends. “What was that about? Were you asking for more assignments or something like that?” Marlene teased.

“No,” Hermione answered, rolling her eyes just a little bit, “I was talking to him about staying in the castle this summer.”

“I didn’t know that was a possibility,” Lily said, surprised.

“Technically you can’t. But there are times where the Headmaster allows some students to stay,” Remus answered for her. “Those exceptions are really rare.”

“Remus, my friend, did you talk like a walking library even before Hogwarts?” Sirius asked, clearly trying to get the attention out of Hermione. She was glad for that, but it didn’t work. They were more than used to ignoring Sirius’ antics.

“And why is your case special?” Lily asked again.

Hermione knew the girl wasn’t asking with any malice, even if they were friends, she just couldn’t imagine her being so cruel, but she still didn’t answer. That made it all weird and uncomfortable, until Peter talked.

“You’re coming with us to Hogsmeade anyways right? To say goodbye.”

And even if she hated the kid, Hermione smiled and nodded. “Of course. I need to make sure you lot get into the train, or you’ll miss it.”

The End-Of-The-Term feast was very similar to the ones she had attended herself. The house cup went to Hufflepuff, and when Dumbledore announced that, Lily sent a murderous look towards the Marauders. They had definitely had a little fault in that, as they had been punished too often and they had been the cause of a lot of point loosing.

After they had stuffed their stomachs with the delicious food of the feast, they went to the Common Room for the last time until after summer, but this time, they were all too exhausted to stay up late like they had on the day before. Hermione took her sleeping potion and didn’t wake up until the morning after.

It was hard, seeing the train go without her. But she made sure to put a smile in her lips even after it had been lost in the distance, then, she went back to the castle with Hagrid, with whom she talked about dragons.


	12. Chapter 12

Hermione had thought the castle felt big when Harry and Ron stopped talking to her in their third year, when she had alerted Professor McGonagall of the broom Harry had mysteriously received, however, now that she was truly alone in the castle, it felt enormous. She spent her time practicing with Fiendfyre and having tea with Hagrid, with whom she had connected again after their way back from Hogsmeade at the beginning of summer. He was good company, but he was simply not enough. She missed her friends, all of them, including Harry, Ron, Ginny, George… Everyone she had abandoned to die.

She still had horrible nightmares, she had realized after trying to go through a week without the potion. It had seemed like a good idea, now that she didn’t have company in her room, but when she woke up drenched in sweat, she realized she had been stupid, those nightmares were not going to stop suddenly.

Finally, when the first of September arrived, Hermione was static. She had asked Hagrid to take her with him to Hogsmeade, but he had told her it would be a mess, “you haven’t seen how it gets, too many confused students. You won’t find them.” Then, he had suggested that she waited for them in the Great Hall. She did that, her hands trembling with both excitement and fear, she waited and waited for them to arrive, and she perked up when the first students walked in, only to find out they were some older Slytherins. She started to sulk when more and more students arrived and she still didn’t find her friends. Until she saw Sirius. She jumped off her seat and practically run towards him, when she reached him, she hugged him. Sirius had been the one she had missed the most, because it had been the only one that had not mailed her once, he hadn’t answered to her owls and that hurt, but seeing him here made her forget it.

“Hmm, I like this, maybe we should make this hugging thing an everyday thing,” he said, and she pulled away with a soft smile. “Hey.”

“Hello, you idiot,” she answered, “now it’s time you explain didn’t you write me back.”

Sirius rolled her eyes, and made a face, maybe he had had to do this same thing in the train with the others. Hermione didn’t balk down. “My mom doesn’t like mail that smells like Gryffindor garbage,” he said, and by his tone, she could tell he was quoting her. “I didn’t receive your letters, so I am not to blame.”

Hermione felt sad, but she nodded, trying to hide it. Then, she saw the other boys, still hanging there, a little bit awkwardly, and that made her smile. She hugged James, and then Remus, and she patted Peter in the back. She wasn’t sure she could stomach hugging him. “It’s good to see you, boys, I missed you.”

“We missed you too,” Remus said, and they started to make their way to the Gryffindor table, that was slowly filling up. “How was your summer?”

It was Hermione’s turn to make a face. “Boring,” she said. “My only way of passing time was having tea with Hagrid, and you can only have a quantity of tea per day, you know? At least I had access to the library even if Madam Pince was on vacation.”

James was telling her about his trip to France when someone hugged Hermione from behind. Even after almost a year of being away from war, her reflexes answered elbowing whoever was behind her and grabbing her wand. Only when she pointed it at the person who had startled, did she realize it was Marlene, and she was looking at her with a mix of fear and pain. “Oh my god,” Hermione let out, lowering her wand. “Oh my god, Marlene… I am so sorry, are you okay?”

The girl nodded, trying to give Hermione a smile that didn’t exactly work as a smile. “I’m alright. I’m sorry I startled you.” After a moment of silence, Marlene hugged Hermione, “I missed you,” said the girl.

“I missed you too,” Hermione answered. “Where are Mary, Lily and Julia?” She asked, noticing they were not with Marlene.

“Oh…, we had a little fight on the train, I’m sure they are sitting… somewhere,” she looked at the large table and shrugged, faking she didn’t care.

“Sit with us, then,” Hermione said, smiling brightly at the girl.

“I am ravenous,” Sirius sad, looking sadly at his empty plate.

“That’s because you are growing,” Hermione answered matter-of-factly. “And also you were gifted with a stomach so big you are never full.”

Sirius smiled at her cheekily, but it was James who spoke, “We’re going to have to go through the sorting of the first years, before eating, and all I want to do is sleep.”

“You are always sleeping,” Marlene pointed out, “are you sure you are not part sloth, or something?”

They all laughed, but fell silent when Professor McGonagall walked into the room followed by a trail of kids. Just like she did every year, the witch explained the procedure and then started to call names.

“Regulus Black,” McGonagall said eventually.

She felt Sirius stiffen next to her, and she planed a hand in his arm, to tell him it would be alright, even when she knew it wouldn’t. She knew the destiny that awaited the younger Black, and it was horrible.

“SLYTHERIN!” The sorting hat declared after less than a minute.

Again, Sirius’ body got rigid, and Hermione tightened her hold. She didn’t look away from McGonagall, and Sirius didn’t either, but she could feel her friends dying to say something. She was relieved when they didn’t. As more and more names were called, Sirius started to relax.

One by one, all the kids got sorted in one of the fourth houses, and while Hermione applauded excitedly with the rest of her house when one of the kids was sorted into Gryffindor, she had to admit it was rather tedious.

Her stomach was rumbling alongside with her friends’ when the ceremony was finally over, and the feast started. She ate fast, wanting to go back to the Common Room as fast as she could, but it didn’t go unnoticed how Sirius barely ate. She knew where his mind was, but she also knew he would be hungry later in he didn’t eat, so she turned to him and in a low voice she said, “eat something.”

It didn’t seem to help, because Sirius didn’t even acknowledge her. Once they were in the Common Room, the Black boy got into his room as fast as he could. After a couple of seconds of hesitation, the rest of the Marauders followed him.

“You should go too,” Marlene said, “never leave it to comfort someone to James Potter,” she was smiling slightly.

“You need some comfort too,” Hermione said, not having forgotten about the Mary-Lily-Julia incident at the train. “You want to tell me what happened?”

“Maybe tomorrow. Just go with them, Hermione, really.”

After a couple of seconds thinking it over, she nodded and got up to the boy’s room. She knocked once and opened the door, she found Sirius sitting in an enlarged bed – Hermione guessed the boys had charmed two beds to be one bigger bed, considering there were only three beds in the room, and had to suppress her surprise –, he was scowling, and James and Peter were patting him awkwardly in the back, not knowing what to do. Remus was siting in one of the single beds, also looking lost. They all looked up at her when she opened the door. She shooed Peter out of the bed and took his place next to Sirius, hugging him. He didn’t react.

“It will be alright,” she said.

“No. It really won’t,” Sirius said, and his voice gave out that he was about to cry. Hermione selfishly hoped he wouldn’t. “He’s going to hate me now. And I’m going to hate him, because those snakes are going to do what my mom has been trying to do since he was born. He’s going to be a horrible person.”

“He doesn’t have to be,” Hermione said, still hugging him with one arm. “Not all Slytherins are that bad, you know? Don’t give up on him, and I’m sure he won’t give up on you.”

It hurt to say those things when she knew the truth. Knowing Sirius and Regulus would be like cat and dog, and seeing her friend so affected by what he apparently knew too, left her feeling hopeless. Again, as all the other times they had been in the boys’ room, they fell asleep, but this time, Hermione was carrying a vial of her potion.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is pretty short, but I hope you like it anyways! Also, I've not made Hagrid talk like JK does in her books simply because I have no idea how to do that. English is not my first language and I'm not that good with it, I hope it doesn't bother you too much (he'll be appearing throughout the story, so you'll have to endure it quite a lot)

The beginning of the second year was slow, she spent most of her evenings in the Room of Requirement, and after dinner, she usually spent some time with either the Marauders, or the girls in her room, who had solved their differences by the second day – Hermione still didn't know what their fight was about, but she guessed it wasn't too bad if they had made up so soon.

One day, a first year walked towards their table in the library, trembling slightly, and asked Remus how he’d gotten the scars in his neck. Again, Hermione was the first to answer, “he tried playing quidditch with a hedgehog.”

The rest of their friends didn’t say a thing, and eventually, the boy left, muttering about how stupid could someone be to play quidditch with a hedgehog. Hermione snickered at the lack of sarcastic sense that the boy seemed to have, and continued to work on her homework.

“You don’t have to do that, you know?” Remus eventually said, his voice weird.

Hermione shrugged, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

Everything went fluidly normal until their new Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor proved how much of an idiot he was three weeks after the term had started, when he started a campaign against magical creatures. “We cannot trust them, none of them. Their minds are not entirely human, some of them are not even slightly human! We must contain their numbers before they are too much to be controlled!” he was saying, rather bitterly.

She saw the way Remus started sinking in his sit, and her blood started boiling. She didn’t want to see such a great boy so embarrassed for what he was, for something he could not control in any way. She didn’t even raise her hand before she started talking. “That’s stupid,” a few gasps were heard, one of them came from Sirius, who was sitting next to her. Hermione had already made herself a reputation that wasn’t really that far from the one she had had on her time. Everyone knew her as the hardworking nerd who always talked respectfully to Professors. Even the Marauders were surprised, not having seen her acting that way towards a superior figure as was Professor York. “Magical creatures have minds, even if they are not human, they do not deserve the massacre you are suggesting. Also, you are forgetting that some of those creatures your talking about are indeed humans.”

“Of course, you are still full of that young idealism. You don’t know how the world works, yet. I’m sure that you wouldn’t be talking like that if you had come across any dangerous magical creature. And those humans you’re talking about, the half breeds, those are not more human than a mermaid.”

Her bitterness got the best of her, and she answered without thinking, “actually, I have, Professor. I confronted a werewolf, and I’m both alive and not hating of them. I’ve also come across hippogriffs, a three-headed dog, centaurs – who saved my life –, and even a dragon, once, wait, twice. So, let me tell you, I have enough experience.”

When she finished talking, Professor York started laughing. Then, she realized she was only a second-year for him and regretted saying that. “I’m sure, in our dreams, every creature is tamable,” his words dragged out a laugh from basically everyone in the class. She didn’t look back to her friends, because if she had found them laughing, it would have broken her heart. So she never saw them looking at the teacher angrily.

Fuming and humiliated, Hermione grabbed her things and got out of the room. Before she closed the door, she could hear York calling her to come back, and she wasn’t planning on it, but if she had been, the snark comment that came next would have made her change her mind.

It was in her next class – Transfiguration – when she met her friends again. “I just don’t understand why you lied,” said Sirius, and he was not using the same mocking tone as York had, but it was still clear that he didn’t believe her. More than clear.

Hermione curled her hand in a fist, her nails digging into her skin. “I wasn’t lying.”

“You two should pay attention,” interrupted Remus, pointing at McGonagall, who was going over how to turn a beetle into a button.

That afternoon, Hermione decided to not risk manipulating Fiendfyre in her state, as it could end terribly. She didn’t want to be in the Common Room, either, because the news had spread, and she could feel everyone’s eyes on her in the corridors, and being in Common Room would left her in the open so everyone could talk to her about the class. She didn’t want to be with her friends because Sirius was pressing the matter and irritating her so much that she thought she might hex him, and she still reminded Dumbledore’s threat of expulsing her.

“I’m going to Hagrid’s,” Hermione told James, who was walking with her. The others were with Sirius walking a few steps before them, probably sensing how close she was to hexing him. Hermione suspected it was just because they didn’t want more yelling. Or to escort their friend to the hospital wing.

“You are not going to the library?” James asked teasingly.

She just smiled tightly at him.

When she knocked at the door of Hagrid’s hut, she realized that maybe he was busy, and maybe she would be imposing. Before she could retreat, the door opened. Hagrid said hello and let her into the hut, frowning slightly “I thought you wouldn’t come back. Figured you’d be with your friends.”

“I’d like to think of you as a friend too, Hagrid,” Hermione said. Hagrid’s eyes were shining brightly, and Hermione wondered if he had any other students who considered him as such. In her time, Hermione, Ron and Harry had been Hagrid’s friends, but she didn’t know of any other student who visited him as much as they did.

When the half-giant asked her how her school year was going, she went into a furious rant about the DADA teacher, “he was talking about murder, Hagrid, about a massacre” she said, her voice trembling with rage, “this is the reason why the dark creatures are likely to choose Voldemort’s side.”

The man gasped, “don’t say his name, Hermione,” he grumbled. “And how do you even know about this? You’re just a kid.”

Again, her blood started boiling. She was nineteen years old, even if her body seemed only twelve, and it unnerved her how people treated her. She was not stupid, even if she had been twelve indeed, she would still not be stupid. 

In the end, she went to the library, where she hoped no one would bother her and call her a liar. She saw Remus there, surrounded by books, and when she decided he wouldn’t press the matter, she sat next to him. He raised his head and smiled.

“What are you doing?” she asked, eyeing the books.

“I’m looking for a charm that will cheer Sirius up,” Remus explained.

“A mood charm? Those are really difficult,” she answered, frowning a little bit. Mood charms were used just in extreme situations, and using it in Sirius could be dangerous, even if it was performed by a skilled wizard. She couldn’t imagine how dangerous would it be if performed by a reckless second year.

“I was thinking more about something to mess with Slytherins,” Remus answered. “Maybe you can help me. Sirius hasn’t been the same since the sorting ceremony and messing up with snakes always cheers him up.”

Hermione was sometimes surprised by Remus. She had known he was a Marauder, and she knew he got into trouble, but she hadn’t expected him to be so… reckless. To be so willing to mess with Slytherins. Of course, she had met him as a grown man, and she knew he had suffered a lot, and that had changed his behavior, but it was still weird.

“Or you could be normal people and just talk to him,” Hermione suggested.

“Yeah, we could do that,” Remus said, but they both knew his mind was still fixed in the prank.


	14. Chapter 14

Sirius had been more cheerful after the prank Remus had orchestrated, even if he had been at the end of McGonagall’s angry rant.

“I just told Minerva that I spent the whole night in our rooms. She doesn’t believe it, but she can’t accuse me of anything,” he told them after it. Hermione chastised him for using the professor’s first name, but she couldn’t help but smile at his renovated mood.

Said good mood lasted until right before Christmas, when a couple of Slytherins decided to pick on her. They were calling her a liar for what had happened on DADA, and they ended up talking about her body, “you are just so ugly,” one of them said.

“Yeah, that hair makes you look like a werewolf, and it’s so gross,” continued a girl.

Hermione’s answer was to raise an eyebrow, not really affected by their words. She was mature enough to know that what they were saying didn’t matter. She may not be extremely happy with her hair or her teeth, but she was used to them. It was her body, and Hermione was comfortable in it. Sirius, however, didn’t react so well when he heard the words. They hadn’t been walking together, or he would have stopped it before they could even think of saying such things, he was just exiting class when he heard what they were saying. He rushed to the boy who had called him ugly and pushed him, raising his wand to the girl.

“Take it back,” he said, his voice angry.

“It’s okay, Sirius,” Hermione said. Her voice was soft, trying to not startle him, trying to calm him. “You’ll get in trouble, lower the wand.”

“They were saying bad things,” Sirius insisted, his raging eyes still on the Slytherins. “And they should apologize.”

“And if we don’t, what will you do, Black?” The boy – who was still on the floor – said. Hermione thought he was in no position to talk to Sirius like that, the boy could easily hex him, even if he didn’t know a lot of hexes.

Sirius had the same thoughts and sent them both different hexes. “ _Redactum skullus_!” he said, pointing at the girl and he quickly turned to the boy and exclaimed “ _anteoculatia_!”

The effects were immediate, the girl’s head started srinking, while she made distressed noises, Hermione knew the hex itself didn’t hurt, but feeling your head growing smaller in your hands was still scary. She turned to look at the boy, only to see two antlers growing from his head. Hermione looked at Sirius, who was laughing so hard that his face was red. She frowned and pointed her wand to the girl, casting a simple _engorgio skullus_ to get her head the right size, and an _evanesco_ to get rid of the boy’s horns. Both Slytherins run away, and once they were out of sight, she turned to Sirius, who still had a pompous smile stretching his mouth.

“What were you thinking?” She asked, her voice louder than what she was expecting. “That could have gone horribly!”

“I heard what they were saying, and they deserved it,” he answered defensively. He also crossed his arms.

She realized, not for the first time, that they were more or less the same height, and she decided to use it in her advantage, fixing her eyes in his. “If anyone had seen this, you could be expelled, Sirius. They can still tell someone, and you won’t be coming back to Hogwarts. Do you want that?”

The boy looked down shamefully, and then shrugged, “I am not going to apologize. I did what I had to.”

“I’m sure you think so, but you’ll have to be more careful,” Hermione said, taking his arm and starting to walk to their Common Room, “what would we do without you, Sirius? Everything would be so boring…”

Sirius laughed a little with that. They didn’t mention what had happened again, and the two Slytherins didn’t report back to any professors, probably too embarrassed.

Before any of them realized it, the Christmas holidays were just a few days ago, and they had a lot of assignments, even more than the year before. They were all sitting in the Common Room, watching two fourth years play magical chess, when James said: “I am thinking that you should come home with me this Christmas, my mom has been nagging me to meet you since I first told her about you in my first letter home.”

“Yes! That would be great!” exclaimed Peter. Hermione had realized how eager he was to be in his friends’ company. That was what everyone had said back in her third year, and Hermione saw how right it was.

“Yeah, it might be fun, but I’d have to ask my parents” Remus said, hesitantly. She was sure he wanted to check the moon state before giving an affirmative answer.

“There is no way I’m going home after Regulus’ sorting, so my other option is staying at Hogwarts, and I’m sure I’d enjoy making fun of you baby photos a lot more,” said Sirius. He was sitting next to Hermione, and her hand itched to comfort him in any way, knowing how his situation at home was. She kept her hand to her, not wanting the boy to close. Adult Sirius had always been cautious to not share a great deal of his parents’ abuse, not even to Harry.

She didn’t realize she had zoned out until Sirius tapped her forehead. “What about you, Hermione?” asked James, smiling brightly at her.

“You invite me too?” she asked, surprised.

She was friends with them, at least with three of them, but she definitely wasn’t as close to them as they were with each other.

“Of course!” James frowned, “you are my friend. I would invite you a hundred times over these idiots, if that’s the matter.”

The so-called idiots made sounds of protest, but Hermione couldn’t hide her laugh. “I’d be glad to go, James, thank you.”

Her mind wandered to her practices with Fiendfyre, but she supposed she could go back to them once Christmas was over, there was still time. Too much time, and it made her nervous. She shook the thoughts out of her mind and turned to her friends again. They were talking about the quidditch season and how Ravenclaw was going to crush Hufflepuff to the ground.


	15. Chapter 15

 

She had talked to Dumbledore and let him know about her plans for Christmas. “I think that will be good, Miss Granger, the potion will work best when you spend time with people your age.”

She knew long term de-aging potions influenced the person’s mind too, taking their conscience back to how it had been at the desired age. She wasn’t sure she had experienced it yet. Sometimes she caught herself thinking in a really immature way, but considering it was the first time in years life she wasn’t in constant immediate danger, she thought it may just be a normal young adult thing.

When she got back to her room, she just wanted to sleep but instead, Julia talked to her “I heard Remus and James talking you,” she said, “they were saying you were going to spend Christmas at James’ house”

“I am,” she answered tiredly.

“You’re going to go there with them!? But they are boys!” Mary almost screeched.

“Yeah, they are just boys, you’re saying it like it was a boggart or something,” she said, while getting ready to bed.

“I get that you are their friend, Hermione, but they are still boys and…”

Hermione interrupted Mary with a laugh. “Mary, they are just boys, they are twelve years old, and they are not going to do anything funny. And if they did, James’ friends are going to be there!”

“Sirius is thirteen,” was the witch’s only answer. Hermione decided to ignore it and finally went to sleep.

The first time she met Fleamont and Euphemia Potter were older than what she had expected, and they both hugged their son tightly before turning to his friends. James introduced them, and she was instantly engulfed by Euphemia, who turned to Sirius once she pulled away. Hermione saw the Black Heir tense under the embrace, but he didn’t pull away. After him went Peter and Remus, who gladly returned the witch’s motherly hug.

“I am so glad you could come!” The woman said, and Hermione wondered if being easily excited even being elderly was a wizard thing.

“Yes, we’ve been wanting to meet James’ friends for a while now,” he was just a tad more serious than his wife, but considering how she was, it wasn’t much.

Hermione was wondering how would they exactly get to the Potter’s residence. Actually, she didn’t really know how wizards usually travelled back home from King’s Cross. Ron’s parents went by car, but considering how mesmerized his dad was with every creation by muggles, she couldn’t be surprised. She guessed other wizards took muggle ways of transportation too, but she just couldn’t imagine the Malfoys driving, or worse, taking a cab. She knew James’ parents wouldn’t have any problems with muggles or their stuff, but they were still pureblood, so it did surprise her when she saw the gray care to where Fleamont Potter was leading them.

“You have a car?” Asked Sirius excitedly. “My mom says they are death traps created by muggles who don’t value their live, but I’ve always wanted to go in one!”

Both adults shared a look, probably knowing exactly who Sirius’ mom was and what were her ideas on everything relating muggles. The car ride wasn’t too exciting for Hermione, James was telling his parents every detail of the three months they had been at school, Sirius was looking all around him, Peter was turning green, and Remus was just smiling at James’ stories. The back seat of the car had been enlarged enough to fit five kids, but she still had to dodge James’ elbow when he became too enthusiastic.

When they arrived at the house – it was more like a small villa – Hermione couldn’t keep her mouth shut. Harry’s thin body flashed into her mind, and she cursed everything she knew, because to see how good his life could have been if it hadn’t been for Voldemort… It broke her.

“So dramatic,” someone said besides her. When she turned, she saw Remus, smiling knowingly at her. “Almost as dramatic as James, so I guess it is fitting.”

She tried to smile at him and followed the group inside. The inside of the house was beautiful, the walls were filled with beautiful landscapes and a few portraits, all of them looking at them curiously, and the furniture was all the same dark color. Everything seemed so expensive that her heart broke again a little, thinking of how few things Harry had that were really his.

“James, show your friends their rooms, and come back to have dinner” Fleamont said.

His son nodded and guided his friends towards a staircase. “Mom made Jilly prepare three rooms. One is for Hermione, another one is for Remus and Peter and I will share mine with Sirius. I tried to make you sleep with them, but mom hit me with a spoon when I brought it up.”

They all laughed, but Hermione said, “how could she hit you if you told her when we were at Hogwarts?” Sirius, Remus and Peter ceased their laughs and after thinking about it for a couple of seconds, nodded, Sirius even added a “yeah, how?”

 “I sort of planned this since summer,” James said, not looking at them. “I just… I didn’t want to be friends only when we were at Hogwarts.”

Hermione was the first to answer, grabbing his hand and saying, “you are our friend, James, in and out of Hogwarts.”

“Yeah, mate, we aren’t worse friends because we spend some time apart,” Remus added, his voice was also soft.

James smiled at them.

“Yeah, baby James,” Sirius mocked, and Peter laughed.

James showed them their rooms, hers was next to James’, and the one Remus and Peter were to share was at the other side of the corridor. “Let’s go eat, you can unpack later,” said James.

They made their way back to the first floor and followed James to the dinning room, it was beautiful, just as the rest of the house. Euphemia was sitting at the head of the table, with Fleamont at his side, and James’ lack of reaction gave away that they were their usual places. Sirius seemed dumbfounded, but he shook it off quickly, sitting next to James (who had sat next to his mother). Hermione could see the stiffness of Remus’ movements when he sat next to James’ father, and she quickly sat next to him. That left Peter to sit next to Sirius. Only then did Hermione realize how big the table was. Of course, the Potters were a famous pureblood family, and with such a big house they were probably used to accommodate much more people. That realization only made her feel more uneasiness.

A little house elf appeared then, probably the Jilly James had talked about. Hermione felt her heart ache at the clothes she was wearing. They were nowhere as ratty as Dobby’s, but they were old and used. When the house elf brought her plait, Hermione smiled and thanked her.

When they had finished eating, the boys went to the backyard, they were walking so excitedly that they didn’t notice Hermione not following them. Instead, she had been held back by Euphemia, who offered her a sweet smile. Hermione couldn’t see this woman abusing of a house elf, and Jilly didn’t seem to be afraid of her or Fleamont, but they were pureblood, they probably thought of their slave as an inferior being, or maybe they hadn’t given the matter a second thought.

“I saw you looking at Jilly, and I know what you think,” Euphemia said softly. “She’s very happy here, serving us. I’m sure she’d be hurt if we told her to leave. This is her home as well.”

“Yes, Miss,” Hermione mumbled, not wanting to get involved in an argument. She hadn’t been listened any other time she had protected house elves rights, and she had been older than she was now. Miss Potter would probably just brush away her ideas.

“Please, Hermione, tell me what you’re thinking,” the woman said.

Hermione hesitated just for a few seconds. “It’s difficult to believe that someone genuinely wants to stay somewhere they are bound to be. House Elves think they are happy serving wizards because they have spent their whole lives being slaves.”

Euphemia smiled, and Hermione was ready to hear how much of a stupid little girl she was, but instead the woman said “I very much agree. That’s why, as soon as I was Jilly’s legal Mistress, I gave her the dress she’s wearing today, she never takes it off because it reminds her of her freedom. At first, she cried, thinking I was punishing her, kicking her out of my house. Instead, I gave her the right to choose, and she chose to stay here and work for us.”

Hermione felt an enormous respect for the older witch. “I’m sorry I assumed,” she said quietly, but Euphemia just smiled at her again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, guys. I just read a comment of someone telling me how pointless this plot is. Honestly, this story is not my best job, nor I intend it to be. I am writing this just for fun, and there is no major reason for Hermione to go back in time than me wanting to work with her in that setting... However, I thought maybe someone would like it just to pass the time, that's why I posted it, but I understand that not everyone is going to like it. Not everyone would like it even if it was the best I could do.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys! I started to roleplay a little bit on my tumblr! It would mean a lot if you guys followed me there too, here's the link: http://ravenclaw-has-claws.tumblr.com/ !!

“Your mother is a wonderful woman,” Hermione said later that afternoon, when they were all in James’ room.

“I know,” the boy said proudly.

“You’re such a mommy’s boy,” Sirius snickered, and Hermione wondered if he made those remarks because he was jealous. Euphemia Potter and Walburga Black were different in every imaginable way, and how they treated their sons was just one of them.

“I’m not sure you can be anything but a mommy’s boy with Euphemia Potter,” she said, shrugging.

“Imaging how hilarious will it be when James is old and he’s still babied.” Remus barked a laugh at his own joke, followed by both Sirius and Peter. Hermione could only manage to smile with the ache in her heart.

She didn’t know a lot about the Potter family, but she knew James’ parents died of dragon pox when he was still young.

They spent most of their time talking, playing magical chess and exploring the grounds (Hermione was sure James already had knowledge of everything they had discovered). The witch was stricken by how at ease she felt with them, almost as she had felt with Harry and Ron when they spent time at the Burrow – at Hogwarts they spent way too much time in danger to really just be normal friends.

For two weeks, Hermione didn’t think of Horcruxes, or Fienfyre, or other things, she just felt like a normal kid. The moment she realized this, she forced herself to give Dumbledore some credit, he was right, after all, spending time with the boys had given her thirteen-year-old conscience. Every time she thought about it, she started feeling a headache creeping up her skull, so she decided to let it happen, even if not knowing made her mad.

Another thing she realized was how different this Sirius was from the one she had met. It was not only his hunted eyes that had changed, but also his manners. He was bitter with everything regarding James’ relationship with his parents, but she saw his eyes shining whenever he was given any kind of affection – she once thought he was going to cry when Fleamont patted his shoulder after helping Jilly clean up one of his messes – and he had incredible manners. Those manners where obviously part of his pureblood upbringing (the one James’ hadn’t had), and they included making his bed every morning, waking up early even on vacation and cleaning up after himself. James had asked him about it one day, and Sirius had stiffly shrugged it off, all of them noticed, but they didn’t say anything. Hermione knew James would not comment on it again.

However, they didn’t spend the whole Christmas break playing and fooling around. Hermione and Remus made sure they spend at least an hour every day doing homework. It was not just an hour in her case, because even with the sleeping potion, she always woke up early, and used the time to study. Sirius usually joined her, but instead on studying, he spent his time playing with muggle charmed cards. The house was big enough to have a room to be called a library, where Hermione and the others studied, the walls were filled with shelves which were filled with books themselves, and there was a big ebony table that Mr. Potter let Hermione use when she went there in the morning. There were some chairs scattered around the room, and Sirius always dragged one to the other side of the table when he played cards while she studied.

“I didn’t think you’d know any muggle games,” she said one morning, noticing she didn’t recognize whatever he was playing at.

“I don’t know any, I’m kind of making up my own,” he confessed.

She suppressed a laugh and offered to teach him some of her favorite games. They were laughing loudly when the others found them. James was surprised to find them sitting in the floor of the library, surrounded by cards and red faced with laughter. “Mom says you guys should have breakfast,” he said.

Hermione and Sirius had to eat alone, because the others had eaten just when they had woken up, thinking the other two had done the same. They were still eating when Hermione heard a crash and a yelp, and they looked at each other, instantly knowing it was the boys, making a mess. A couple of minutes later, Remus walked into the kitchen, looking at the floor. “Hermione,” he mumbled, even if both her and Sirius were already looking at him expectantly.

“What did you do?” She asked. In her head, there were a lot of different scenarios that could have caused the crash, but she didn’t expect Remus’ answer.

“We were trying to charm a quill to make it insult everyone who tried to use it… And we tried some charms and somehow the quill flew to your room… He heard a crash and when Wesaw what happened… You know we would never do it in purpose…” He was rambling, and Hermione didn’t understand what he was saying.

“Remus,” she interrupted, “just tell me what happened.”

“We broke the vials of your sleeping potion…” Remus mumbled pathetically.

Hermione felt her heart skip a beat. They had only two days left of their vacations, and it was not enough time to brew the potion. Maybe, if she was lucky, the Potters might have some, enough for her to sleep a couple of hours without waking the whole house with her screams.

“You can’t… You can’t use magic outside of Hogwarts,” she said weakly.

“We are so sorry, Hermione,” Remus said, not acknowledging her weak attempt.

“We really are.” James and Peter made an appearance, both looking as remorseful as Remus. Hermione thought that they had most probably decided he should tell her because they were similar – the boys would have thought she would be less mad if he broke the news.

In reality, she was not mad, but she was kind of scared. She didn’t want to leave a bad impression of the Potters, and she had been making a good job at it until now but waking them with her shouting didn’t seem like a good bonding experience.

“What are you going to do?” Asked Sirius from besides her. She had almost forgotten he didn’t have anything to deal with the trouble. “James’ dad is good at potions, he’ll make some more for you.”

“It needs more than two days to brew,” Hermione answered, slowly.

“Then go without it. It’ll be just for two nights,” Peter said, “it won’t be too bad.”

Hermione almost laughed. “It’s not just because of me, if I don’t take it, I’ll wake you up with my screams, and believe me, it’d not be pretty.” Her voice had come out harsher than what she intended, but she didn’t mind it a lot.

“Let’s talk to my parents, they’ll find a solution,” James said.

That solution turned out to be calming tea and strong silencing charms. Hermione had to explain that her nightmares were so bad that she would woke up screaming, or maybe not being able to breath properly, on the edge of a panic attack.

She went to sleep tense that night, even with the calming tea and the assurance that she would not be able to break those wards. Hermione didn’t know if she would reach out to her wand, but if she did, she was sure she’d take down the silence charms in seconds. War did that to people.

As expected, she woke up with tears rolling down her cheeks and Harry’s name in her lips. When she looked around, and it downed to her where she was, she forced herself to breathe normally. Then, she heard a soft knock in her door. She frowned and got up to open the door. Sirius was nervously pacing in front of the door and was startled when she opened it.

“What are you doing?” She asked, frowning at her friend.

“I can’t sleep,” he confessed. “I was wondering if the nightmares had already started or not. Maybe you’d like some company.”

They ended up lying in Hermione’s bed and talking about the people in their year. Who was the most talented, who was going to be an important Wizard, who was more likely to be a ministry dummy… And eventually, the sun started to bath the room, but that didn’t stop them from falling asleep again.


	17. Chapter 17

When she woke up the next morning, she could feel Sirius sleeping next to her even if they weren’t touching. She found it weird how normal it felt. Maybe it was the months she had spend with Harry and Ron while they were horcrux hunting, or maybe it was just that Sirius was a great friend, and they just had that kind of trust. Her mind wandered back to the night before, when she had opened the door to find Sirius there.

“’Morning,” said the center of her thoughts.

She looked at him and smiled softly. “Good morning, Sirius,” she said. They stayed a couple minutes in silence, and Hermione suspected Sirius wasn’t completely awake yet. “Why were you up last night?” she finally asked.

The lack of an answer made Hermione think maybe he had fallen asleep again, but when she turned her face to him, she saw he had his eyes opened. “I was worried,” he eventually answered. “Marlene said you got really bad when you had your nightmares and I couldn’t sleep comfortably knowing you were going to have to go through that.”

Hermione grabbed his hand, unable to say anything through the knot in her throat. She should have known. Of course Sirius Black would find the way to turn into an Animagus to help his werewolf friend with his transformations, to be his friend. He was a great boy, Hermione thought, and he would be a great man. Hopefully she’d be successful in eluding his death.

“What do you dream of?” Sirius asked, after a couple more minutes of silence.

Hermione didn’t answer instantly, she took her time thinking of a good answer, just like Sirius had. Of course, she couldn’t answer saying she was dreaming of his best friend’s son dying, or of her not-born-yet best friend slash boyfriend dying, or of everybody dying. Maybe she could tell him that last one, but she knew he’d think she was too young.

“The future,” she finally answered. If she had told Dumbledore she was a seer, maybe she could tell Sirius the same. “I know things that are going to happen soon, and they haunt me.”

“What kinds of things?” Sirius asked quietly.

“I know what will happen with your family,” she said quietly, and she felt him tense next to her. “I’ve seen what happens with the war.”

Sirius turned his head to her, and she saw the most serious expression she had ever seen in him. It was striking, really, even more knowing he was just thirteen years old. “What happens?”

“I can’t say.” She saw the retort forming in his eyes even before he opened his mouth, so she cut him off. “Future is a very delicate thing,” she made her best impression of Luna’s dreamy voice mixed with Professor Trelawney’s, “the way I know things are going to go is good enough, if I tell you anything – even the littlest detail, everything could change.”

“You wake up yelling whenever you have dreams of that, and you say things are going to go well?” Sirius skepticism made her proud in a way.

“Yes, Sirius. They’ll be good enough.” And I’ll change all the bad things, she left unsaid.

“Do you have them often?”

Hermione smiled at him, sensing his worry. “I usually take my potion, and that makes the nightmares go away, but if I don’t… Maybe one every three days, sometimes they are consecutive, others they aren’t. Or at least it was like that before the potion.”

She was about to get up, when Sirius grabbed her arm and said: “if you ever need to talk, even if you can’t say anything about your nightmares, I’ll be here.”

She gave his hand a squeeze and then she got up. “We should go eat breakfast.”

James didn’t realize Sirius had not slept in his room, or if he did, he didn’t say anything when he and the others finally woke up. They were all excited for that day’s plan, but when Hermione asked, they didn’t give her an answer. “It’s a surprise, Hermione, where is your sense of adventure?” Remus had said, with a twinkle on his eyes that she had never seen in him as and adult. She was going to change that as well. Maybe Remus’ life was going to be the most affected, he was not going to have to go through burying two of his best friends, or spend twelve years alone, bathing in self-pity, only to burry his last best friend only two years after knowing he had not betrayed and killed his other best friends. The Remus she had known had been clearly depressed for a long time, and if she could change that, she certainly would.

“Okay Rem, I won’t ask about it again, but only because you seem to be okay with it,” she smiled softly.

The boy’s eyes widened in surprise, and it took her a moment to realize she hadn’t called him by his full name. She wondered if he had ever let someone get so close to call him a nickname. She also wondered if he had reacted the same way to the nickname _Moony_ when the Marauders had first called him like that. She felt sad that he always felt like he had to push people away.

The surprise turned out to be a muggle circus. James’ father went with them, and he seemed to be having fun as much as the kids. It wasn’t a normal circus with clowns and that’s all, there were dancers, equilibrists and even a magician.

Mr Potter bought them all cotton candy, and while the boy seemed a little wary before trying it, once they did, they liked it so much – specially James – that they finished Hermione’s.

“I love muggles,” Sirius declared once they were home again.

“Yeah, they are amazing,” Peter sighed dreamily.

“We should organize something like that for wizards,” Sirius said, looking at his shorter friend excitedly, “maybe for muggles too! But they wouldn’t know there’s magic involved of course…”

“Yes! And we could have equilibrists, just like the muggles had! They could stand in a string and be amazing!”

Hermione smiled, not commenting on Sirius’ and Peter’s behavior, but Remus did. “You guys are so stupid. Muggles and Wizards couldn’t be on the same place without someone outing us.” Hermione couldn’t say it was a lie, she still remembered the Quidditch World Cup, and how disastrous mages were in it. “Also, you guys wouldn’t be able to run a circus.”

“That’s why we have you!” Peter said jokingly, and for a moment, she thought that sentence matched Sirius better than him. Then she realized it did not.

Hermione didn’t like to think of Peter as anything but the traitorous rat he had been in her timeline. However, he was a Marauder, he was sweet and kind of cunning and loyal, and he admired his friends, but not like she had heard adults say, as if they were heroes. He was just a kid and he was really difficult to hate.

When she went to sleep that night, she had Euphemia cast silencing charms – she supposedly couldn’t use magic yet. No bad dreams assaulted her that night, and for the first time in a while, she slept in, waking almost at noon to the shocked faces of her friends. “I didn’t know you had it in you to sleep so much!” James had commented.

Hermione had apologized, but she couldn’t bring herself to care that much. After all, she had had the best sleep of almost a year.


	18. Chapter 18

Too soon, they were back at King’s Cross. Hermione was going to miss life with the Potters, but she wasn’t half as vocal as Sirius and Peter were about it. James seemed upset too, “I’ll invite you again next year. And maybe you can spend a week during summer” he even said. Sirius had fallen silent again, and Hermione discretely took his hand in hers. She had told him she had seen things, and had mentioned his family, so maybe he wouldn’t give it another thought.

Through all the train ride, the boys seemed to be sulking, and Hermione had her mind in the castle. She wondered how long it would take her to control Fiendfyre. She could not risk trying to destroy a horcrux if she didn’t have complete control over it, or she would end up death, and her work would be for nothing.

When they arrived at Hogsmeade, the boys’ mood got better, but Hermione’s only got worse and worse. They had dinner together, but Hermione didn’t eat a lot and when she finished, she went to the library, not paying attention to her friends’ complaints.

When she got there, she went straight to where she had found other books regarding Fienfyre. It didn’t take her long to find a diary that someone had written while they were learning to handle the curse. She was reading it avidly when someone sat next to her. She saw James, which surprised her, because if she had expected someone to go there with her, that would have been Remus.

The messy-haired boy, smiled at her and opened a book of his own, as if it was completely normal that he was in the library without Remus or Hermione having had to nag him.

“What are you doing here?” Hermione asked suspiciously.

James looked up from his book and for the first time, his innocent face was real. “I didn’t want you to be alone,” he answered in a whisper. “You go back to your book, I’m enjoying a muggle read myself.” He showed her his book and she was surprised to find that it was _The Iron Man_ by Ted Hughes.

Maybe Hermione shouldn’t have been so surprised, she had never seen a muggle book at Hogwarts (one that she hadn’t brought herself), and even less on the hands of a pureblood, but this was James Potter. She shouldn’t have any expectations about him, because he was a really unordinary boy, just like the other Marauders, really.

She nodded and went back to the diary. They stayed at the library until their eyes were tired, and when they made their way back to the Common Room, none of the Marauders were there, and Hermione started to get suspicious again.

“Are you sure you are not up to anything?” She asked James.

“You’re hurting me, Hermione,” he said mockingly. Her hard stare made him roll his eyes and shrug. “Maybe Peter ate so much that his tummy ached, and they stayed in the room with him,” he said.

She wasn’t very convinced by that, even if it had happened a couple times already. It more likely that they had done something wrong and maybe James was even involved – that would be a good reason why he was at the library without having a wand pointed at his neck.

Bellatrix Lestrange flashed in his mind because of that thought, and she felt like vomiting.

“I’m going to my room,” she said, her voice way weaker than it had been before the memory of the crazed witch craving a word in her arm.

James tried to get her to stay with him at the Common Room, but she didn’t listen to him. She just wanted to curl in her bed and cry. She hadn’t cried since getting there, she noticed. She hadn’t really let it sink that she would never be best friends with Harry and Ron, and that only if she succeed in her mission, if she didn’t, Harry would die, and Ron might too.

She had calmed down her sobs when the room door was opened forcefully and Lily walked in yelling. “Tell your friends to leave Severus alone, Hermione, or so help me, I’ll turn them all into toads!”

Hermione sat up frowning. “What?” She asked. Her voice was rough because of all the sobbing she had done, but Lily didn’t seem to notice.

“Your friends” her tone was like acid “hexed Severus’ clothes and humiliated him in front of everyone. It’s not the first time they have done something like this. Make them stop.”

“I am not responsible for them,” Hermione said. “And even if I was, I don’t think that would be enough to make them stop.”

“You’re their friend,” Lily retorted, still angry.

“Yes, not their mother,” Hermione was not in the mood to listen to Lily’s complaints, she just felt exhausted, almost limp.

Lily grunted, “you go to their room and tell them to leave Severus alone. They are nothing more than bullies!”

“Maybe they’ll stop when Snape stops being a git,” Hermione answered reflectively.  
The other girl gasped, “you are just like them!”

Hermione rolled her eyes, knowing she couldn’t hate Lily just for her immaturity. She was not yet the woman who would sacrifice herself to save Harry, Hermione thought, she’ll go through a lot of experiences to get there. However, knowing she couldn’t hate her, didn’t stop Hermione from getting up and leaving mid-argument. She went to the boys’ room and knocked loudly. When he opened the door, Sirius frowned at her, “what are you doing here?” He asked.

“You picked on Snape and now Lily is angry and wouldn’t let me sleep. It’s only fair that you guys give me refuge.” She enlarged Sirius’ bed without giving it a second thought and got in. “If you make noise and you don’t let me sleep, I’ll make your noses disappear,” she warned.

The boys talked in whispers to not disturb her, maybe afraid of her going through with her threat. What she didn’t realize was that she hadn’t taken her potion, and she hadn’t placed a silencing charm either.

Harry was walking towards a man with the face of a snake, and he was talking, telling him how he had never known love, that he wouldn’t go far without it. The snake-faced man had only smiled and pronounced two words. The green light had hit Harry straight in the chest, making him fall and not move again. The shout Hermione let out wasn’t only in the dream. When she opened her eyes, she found Sirius talking to her, his eyes full of worry. “Harry,” she gasped. She was crying and couldn’t breathe normally, but she wasn’t having a panic attack. She looked past Sirius to see messy, black hair, and she freed herself from him to launch herself to the second boy.

“Harry,” she gasped again.

“Hermione?” The boy said, and the voice was all wrong.

She breathed in, and the smell wasn’t right either, which made her pull away. She was more awake now, and she saw the differences between him and Harry, his nose was straighter and his eyes were hazel, also his face was rounder. And he was way too young to be her deceased friend. It was not the first time she had noticed all the differences between both of them, but it had never hurt as much as it did in that moment. “James,” she muttered, hugging him again, for different reasons.

“Are you alright?” Another boy asked. She knew it was Remus, and she nodded, pulling away from James.

“I’m okay,” she answered. “I’m sorry I woke you.”

“Don’t be, Mione,” Peter said from his bed.

He was looking at her kind of shyly, having used that nickname for the first time. Ron and Harry sometimes called her like that, but they mostly used her full name, and she and the Marauders hadn’t used nicknames yet – well, she had with Remus, but only a couple of times. The fact that it had been Peter the first one to call her like that, made her heart ache. Her heart always seemed to ache near the boy. She still couldn’t understand his treason.

“What hour is it?” She asked.

“It must be a little past four,” Sirius answered from besides her.

“We should go back to sleep,” she said, clearing her throat uncomfortably.

They all nodded and both Remus and James went back to their bed. Sirius lied down, and she did the same. It was a couple of seconds later that she felt him move nearer.

“You sure you’re going to be okay?” He asked.

Hermione smiled sweetly at him and nodded. “I’ll be. Go to sleep, Sirius.”

“Good night,” he mumbled, maybe not too sure about going to sleep with her so obviously distressed.

“Good night.”


	19. Chapter 19

Hermione was sure Lily hated her, and she couldn’t say she minded that much. If the girl wanted to hate her because her friends made fun of his idiot of a friend – Hermione was glad he was not her professor anymore, so she could insult him as she had been wanting to be for her six years of student life – she totally could, but it wouldn’t make sense. Of course, Hermione wasn’t the only one receiving hard stares and cold answers, all the Marauders were too, even James, who had nothing to deal with what had happened. The boys didn’t seem to care that much either, and Hermione could only think about how James would be in a couple of years. Harry had shared the little details he knew of his parents, and she knew he had chased her for years before Lily finally decided to give him a chance. Harry had also said his father had seem like a bit of a jerk, and Hermione was sad that he had had to see that, because James was actually a sweet kid, he was funny and energetic… And Harry hadn’t got to know him as that. He had only known him through Snape’s memories.

When they were at Potions class, Slughorn was going through the steps of making sleeping draught, and she was dutifully taking notes, only to realize how different were they to what Snape had told them. She knew Severus Snape was the best Potions Professor that Hogwarts had seen in a long time, and she admired him for that, even if she still hated him.

“Look who’s spacing out,” James said jokingly besides her. “Don’t come to me later asking for what you missed, Mione.”

Apparently, that nickname was going to stick with them for a long time, none of the boys called her Hermione anymore unless something was up. She didn’t mind so much, really, it was kind of comforting. It was also good to point out differences between the Marauders and Harry and Ron, because then it didn’t feel like she was replacing them. They were different individuals but sometimes it was difficult. She understood how older Sirius had had trouble thinking about Harry without thinking of him as a copy of James.

The next couple of weeks were calm, Lily was still angry, but she had decided to just ignore them, and the boys hadn’t picked on Snape, probably to spare Hermione of another yelling night session from the redheaded.

It was already February when Snape decided to get revenge. However, instead of going after the boys, as any person would have done, he went after Hermione, in a really Slytherin way that she had noted through the years. Maybe she would even write an essay over Slytherin’s treats and how that makes them function.

She was making her way to class alone because she had been at the library, reading the diary again, having hoped to find something useful, when a spell hit her right in the back of her head. She felt it like electricity going through all her body and then concentrate on her hands. She looked down to see them getting larger as seconds passed. She turned and saw Snape and another two Slytherins there, laughing loudly. Snape was just smirking.

She had rushed to the Hospital Wing, and Madam Pomfrey had been fast, giving her at least four potions. It had taken almost an hour, but her hands had gone back to their original size – Hermione thought they were a little bit big, but Pomfrey had basically told her to shut up and go back to class.

“Are you sure you don’t know who did this to you?” The nurse asked.

“No,” answered Hermione. She wasn’t afraid of what would happen if she told her it had been Snape, not at all. He had caught her by surprise, attacking her by the back, any other time, she’d be ready to protect herself. Still, she hoped that by not telling anyone it had been him, this madness would stop.

Of course, she was wrong.

“How could he!?” James had raged once he saw Hermione. The rumor had spread fast and the Marauders had been planning a revenge while she was at the Infirmary. “It’s one thing to do that to us, but you haven’t done anything!”

“He’s going to regret it,” Sirius promised.

“I don’t want you to do anything,” she told them, making them stop walking. “If you do something to get back at him, he’ll do another thing to which you will answer, and he will answer to your thing, and it will never stop. I haven’t told Madam Pomfrey because I want this to stop.”

“Hermione, it’s not going to stop. He thinks he’s entitled to do anything just because he’s one of Slughorns favorites,” Remus reasoned.

“You should think the way I do,” she frowned. Remus had always seemed like a reasonable adult. Where Sirius was temperamental, he was cold headed and always knew what was best, even if it wasn’t what he wanted. Sometimes she wasn’t able to tell this was still a kid, and he had known the full grown adult witch a really hard life that had taught him a lot.

“No! He could have hurt you, Mione. If you don0t want to tell a Professor, we should teach him a lesson,” the boy retorted.

“A lesson that could possibly hurt him just as he could have hurt me, it doesn’t make sense! Just… Leave it like that.”

It took her a lot of convincing, but she eventually got them to drop the topic, and not try an enlarging charm in Snape’s already large nose.

When they got to the Common Room that afternoon after classes, Lily walked towards her and she very awkwardly asked to talk to her privately. Hermione went after her to their room, not knowing what to expect. “You shouldn’t have gotten in the path of Severus’ spell,” she could imagine the other witch saying.

Her actual words surprised her. “I’m sorry for what Severus did to you.”

Hermione frowned and shrugged. “Why are you apologizing for, exactly?” she asked.

“He enlarged your hands, and you had to go to the Infirmary, isn’t that right?” Lily asked, seeming confused.

Hermione nodded. “Did you have anything to deal with that?” Lily didn’t seem like the kind of person who would hex someone who hadn’t done anything to her, and even less if it was from the back, but Hermione didn’t really know her. Maybe she did really blame her for the boys’ actions, and she wanted her to pay for them.

“No!” Lily reacted instantly.

“Then why are you apologizing?” Hermione was really confused.

“Because… Severus is my friend and… He did wrong…” She seemed a lot less convinced than at the beginning of their conversation.

“If someone should apologize, that is him,” Hermione said, “I know he’s not going to, but shouldn’t go around cleaning his messes, Lily. He does wrong, he fixes it. It’s what I told you, you’re his friend, not his mother.”

“I still want to apologize,” she said, her neck straightened.

“I still think it’s not your job to do it,” Hermione answered, copying her posture. “But I appreciate it nonetheless.”

When they made their way back down to the Common Room, Hermione went to the sofa area that the Marauders had claimed as theirs – they always sat there, even in first year – and Lily went to a table where Julia and Marlene were.

“What did she want?” Sirius asked curiously.

“She apologized for Snape,” Hermione answered, sitting next to him. “I don’t know why she did it, it was all his fault. I told her she wasn’t responsible of what he did.”

“I still don’t know why she’s friends with Snivellus.”

“Don’t call him that,” was Hermione’s instant answer.

It was not the first time she had heard them call him that, and she despised the nickname. It was horrible that her friends acted that way, and if she was going to change the future so much as to defeat one of the darkest wizards in centuries, she would try to change the bullying Snape had received. She herself had gone through mocking and cruel behavior at Malfoy’s hands, and she didn’t want anyone – not even Snape – to go through that too. Maybe that would change his decision in the future.

Her friends, as usual, just dropped the subject.


	20. Author's note :)

Hello! It's been a while since I updated this, and even longer since updates were constant. I want to say that I haven't forgotten about this story but I'm really not in the mood to continue it. I have fallen in love with new fandoms and new characters and that is normal and good. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I'm more into marvel RIGHT NOW.

This doesn't mean I'm never going to get back to this story. I probably will, once I've finished writing it and it's edited. Thoroughly edited. When that happens, I probably won't be posting it in this account because I have pretty much abandoned it, I will PROBABLY post it at [persephx ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/persephx)which is the acc that I'm using right now. Again, I've only posted some marvel stuff there. I'm not going to delete this story, just in case any of you (or even me) want to come back to it, and I will post the announcement in a new chapter once I start posting the story again.

I'm sorry it's taking me so long to give you a conclussion, but we're nowhere near right now, and I want to do things right.


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